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Date: | Tue, 18 Jul 2006 13:15:19 -0700 |
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The review article below discusses the approaches used to study natural
selection and adaptations in the human lineage. It provides a nice overview
of the ongoing research in this (interesting) area.
Science 16 June 2006:
Vol. 312. no. 5780, pp. 1614 - 1620
Positive Natural Selection in the Human Lineage
P. C. Sabeti, S. F. Schaffner, B. Fry, J. Lohmueller, P. Varilly, O.
Shamovsky,
A. Palma, T. S. Mikkelsen, D. Altshuler, E. S. Lander
Positive natural selection is the force that drives the increase in
prevalence
of advantageous traits, and it has played a central role in our development
as
a species. Until recently, the study of natural selection in humans has
largely
been restricted to comparing individual candidate genes to theoretical
expectations. The advent of genome-wide sequence and polymorphism data brings
fundamental new tools to the study of natural selection. It is now possible
to
identify new candidates for selection and to reevaluate previous claims by
comparison with empirical distributions of DNA sequence variation across the
human genome and among populations. The flood of data and analytical methods,
however, raises many new challenges. Here, we review approaches to detect
positive natural selection, describe results from recent analyses of
genome-wide data, and discuss the prospects and challenges ahead as we expand
our understanding of the role of natural selection in shaping the human
genome.
Web ref:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/312/5780/1614
Tom Billings
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