From homomorphy to heteromorphy: stratified trajectories of sex chromosome expansion in <i>Silene latifolia</i>

A recent analysis of the <italic>Silene latifolia</italic> Y chromosome has demonstrated that suppressed recombination drives its expansion into evolutionary strata and accelerates functional degeneration through transposable element accumulation, DNA hypermethylation, and gene silencing. This finding reinforces the importance of structural dynamics in plant sex chromosome evolution and drives us to consider the conserved yet flexible trajectories of degeneration across kingdoms, concluding that <italic>S. latifolia</italic> provides a pivotal model for elucidating both canonical and divergent mechanisms of sex chromosome evolution.