So far in this course we have dealt entirely with the evolution of characters that are controlled by simple Mendelian inheritance at a single locus. There are notes on the course website about gametic disequilibrium and how allele frequencies change at two loci simultaneously, but we didn’t discuss them. In every example we’ve considered we’ve imagined that we could understand something about evolution by examining the evolution of a single gene. That’s the domain of classical population genetics. For the next few weeks we’re going to be exploring a field that’s actually older than classical population genetics, although the approach we’ll be taking to it involves the use of population genetic machinery. If you know a little about the history of evolutionary biology, you may know that after the rediscovery of Mendel’s work in 1900 there was a heated debate between the “biometricians” (e.g., Galton and Pearson) and the “Mendelians” (e.g., de Vries, Correns, Bateson, and Morgan). Biometricians asserted that the really important variation in evolution didn’t follow Mendelian rules. Height, weight, skin color, and similar traits seemed to

Human biochemical genetics

The causal role of human papillomavirus infections in cervical cancer has been documented beyond reasonable doubt. The association is present in virtually all cervical cancer cases worldwide. It is the right time for medical societies and public health regulators to consider this evidence and to define its preventive and clinical implications. A comprehensive review of key studies and results is presented.

https://jcp.bmj.com/content/jclinpath/55/4/244.full.pdf

The causal relation between human papillomavirus and cervical cancer

Genetics and analysis of quantitative traits

Temperament describes the idea that individual behavioural differences are repeatable over time and across situations. This common phenomenon covers numerous traits, such as aggressiveness, avoidance of novelty, willingness to take risks, exploration, and sociality. The study of temperament is central to animal psychology, behavioural genetics, pharmacology, and animal husbandry, but relatively few studies have examined the ecology and evolution of temperament traits. This situation is surprising, given that temperament is likely to exert an important influence on many aspects of animal ecology and evolution, and that individual variation in temperament appears to be pervasive amongst animal species. Possible explanations for this neglect of temperament include a perceived irrelevance, an insufficient understanding of the link between temperament traits and fitness, and a lack of coherence in terminology with similar traits often given different names, or different traits given the same name. We propose that temperament can and should be studied within an evolutionary ecology framework and provide a terminology that could be used as a working tool for ecological studies of temperament. Our terminology includes five major temperament trait categories: shyness-boldness, exploration-avoidance, activity, sociability and aggressiveness. This terminology does not make inferences regarding underlying dispositions or psychological processes, which may have restrained ecologists and evolutionary biologists from working on these traits. We present extensive literature reviews that demonstrate that temperament traits are heritable, and linked to fitness and to several other traits of importance to ecology and evolution. Furthermore, we describe ecologically relevant measurement methods and point to several ecological and evolutionary topics that would benefit from considering temperament, such as phenotypic plasticity, conservation biology, population sampling, and invasion biology.

/pdf/integrating-animal-temperament-within-ecology-and-evolution-2rq68t04zd.pdf

Integrating animal temperament within ecology and evolution.

A behavioral syndrome is a suite of correlated behaviors expressed either within a given behavioral context (e.g., correlations between foraging behaviors in different habitats) or across different contexts (e.g., correlations among feeding, antipredator, mating, aggressive, and dispersal behaviors). For example, some individuals (and genotypes) might be generally more aggressive, more active or bold, while others are generally less aggressive, active or bold. This phenomenon has been studied in detail in humans, some primates, laboratory rodents, and some domesticated animals, but has rarely been studied in other organisms, and rarely examined from an evolutionary or ecological perspective. Here, we present an integrative overview on the potential importance of behavioral syndromes in evolution and ecology. A central idea is that behavioral correlations generate tradeoffs; for example, an aggressive genotype might do well in situations where high aggression is favored, but might be inappropriate...

https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/422893

Behavioral syndromes: An integrative overview

Since the survival and well-being of humankind is so inextricably bound to our domestic animals and plants, it is important that we understand the domestication process and its biological consequences. The objective of this review is to discuss available information on the biological basis of animal domestication, with particular emphasis on behavior. Domestication concerns adaptation, which is usually to a captive environment and which is achieved by some combination of genetic changes occurring over generations, as well as by environmentally induced changes in development that recur during each generation. Genetic changes will occur in population of organisms undergoing domestication as a result of both chance and of any shift in selection pressures accompanying the transition from nature to captivity. In addition to changes in gene frequencies, adaptation to the captive environment may be facilitated by certain recurring environmental events or management practices that influence the development of spe...

Behavioral Aspects of Animal Domestication

Behavioral development in animals undergoing domestication

This text synthesizes existing knowledge of the process of domestication and how domestication has affected the behaviour of captive wild and domesticated animals, including both farm, zoo and companion animals. Three broad themes are addressed: genetic contributions to the process of domestication; experimental contributions to the process of domestication; the process of feraliztion (i.e. the adaptation of domesticated animals when returned to their natural habitat.

Animal Domestication and Behavior

This article considers causes of variability in male sexual performance and identifies management techniques that can be used to improve the reproductive success and efficacy of our captive animal populations.

Edward O. Price

Papers

Behavioral Aspects of Animal Domestication

Behavioral development in animals undergoing domestication

Animal Domestication and Behavior

Male sexual behavior.

Individual differences in temperament of domestic dairy goats: constancy and change