Related papers: Natural selection on human Y chromosomes
For many traits, including susceptibility to common diseases in humans, causal loci uncovered by genetic mapping studies explain only a minority of the heritable contribution to trait variation. Multiple explanations for this "missing…
We consider the evolution of populations under the joint action of mutation and differential reproduction, or selection. The population is modelled as a finite-type Markov branching process in continuous time, and the associated…
The Time To the Most Recent Common Ancestor (TMRCA) based on human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is estimated to be twice that based on the non-recombining part of the Y chromosome (NRY). These TMRCAs have special demographic implications…
We study a population of $N$ individuals evolving according to a biparental Moran model with two types, one being advantaged compared to the other. The advantage is conferred by a Mendelian mutation, which reduces the death probability of…
In the absence of selection, the structure of allelic diversity is described by the elegant sampling formula of Ewens. This formula has helped shape our expectations of empirical patterns of molecular variation. Along with coalescent…
Population structure can be modelled by evolutionary graphs, which can have a substantial, but very subtle influence on the fate of the arising mutants. Individuals are located on the nodes of these graphs, competing with each other to…
Game theoretic tools are utilized to analyze a one-locus continuous selection model of sex-specific meiotic drive by considering nonequivalence of the viabilities of reciprocal heterozygotes that might be noticed at an imprinted locus. The…
The spread of synthetic gene drives is often discussed in the context of panmictic populations connected by gene flow and described with simple deterministic models. Under such assumptions, an entire species could be altered by releasing a…
The use of population descriptors like race, ethnicity, and ancestry in science, medicine and public health has a long, complicated, and at times dark history, particularly for genetics, given the field's perceived importance for…
We study the dynamics of an age-structured population in which the life expectancy of an offspring may be mutated with respect to that of its parent. When advantageous mutation is favored, the average fitness of the population grows…
In considering evolution of transcribed regions, regulatory modules, and other genomic loci of interest, we are often faced with a situation in which the number of allelic states greatly exceeds the population size. In this limit, the…
Most of the DNA that composes a complex organism is non-coding and defined as junk. Even the coding part is composed of genes that affect the phenotype differently. Therefore, a random mutation has an effect on the specimen fitness that…
We define a general class of models representing natural selection between two alleles. The population size and spatial structure are arbitrary, but fixed. Genetics can be haploid, diploid, or otherwise; reproduction can be asexual or…
Migrations have played an important role in shaping the genetic diversity of human populations. Understanding genomic data thus requires careful modeling of historical gene flow. Here we consider the effect of relatively recent population…
One of the fundamental principles driving diversity or homogeneity in domains such as cultural differentiation, political affiliation, and product adoption is the tension between two forces: influence (the tendency of people to become…
This article explains how natural selection works and how it has been inappropriately applied to the description of cultural change. It proposes an alternative evolutionary explanation for cultural evolution that describes it in terms of…
A haplotype block, or simply a block, is a chromosomal segment, DNA base sequence or string that occurs in only a few variants or types in the genomes of a population of interest, and that has an encapsulated or 'private' frequency…
Conventional population genetics considers the evolution of a limited number of genotypes corresponding to phenotypes with different fitness. As model phenotypes, in particular RNA secondary structure, have become computationally tractable,…
Sexual selection is a fundamental aspect of evolution for all eukaryotic organisms with mating types. This paper suggests intersexual selection is best viewed as a mechanism to compensate for the unavoidable dynamics of coevolution between…
Over the last fifty years, geneticists have made great strides in understanding how our species' evolutionary history gave rise to current patterns of human genetic diversity classically summarized by Lewontin in his 1972 paper, 'The…