From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Thu Mar 11 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!parc!decwrl!decwrl!wupost!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!malgudi.oar.net!caen!kuhub.cc.ukans.edu!jimdb From: jimdb@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu Newsgroups: sci.bio,bionet.biology.tropical,bionet.population-bio,bionet.general,bionet.jobs,bionet.agroforestry,bionet.sci-resources,sci.environment,sci.research,talk.environment Subject: Summer Entomological Research Assistants Needed Message-ID: <1993Mar12.011937.48053@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> Date: 12 Mar 93 07:19:37 GMT Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services Lines: 53 Xref: biosci sci.bio:2446 bionet.biology.tropical:176 bionet.population-bio:390 bionet.general:4286 bionet.jobs:1582 bionet.agroforestry:274 bionet.sci-resources:639 sci.environment:4653 sci.research:530 talk.environment:2523 ENTOMOLOGICAL RESEARCH ASSISTANTS NEEDED Do you relish being in the desert in late spring? Does the idea of learning (not nearly) all there is to know about field entomology (the study of insects) appeal to you? How does the concept of spending an inordinate quantity of time digging through forest leaf litter on you hands and knees strike you? Well now you can realize these goals and many others in May and June of this year (including your secret fantasy of chasing obscure beetles through the desert)! Applications are currently being accepted for field assistants for the coming summer. Your responsibilities/opportunities will include helping in the search for five species of beetles, all of which are well-integrated guests in the nests of ants of the genus Liometopum in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, and California. Additionally, we will carry out a number of behavioral experiments primarily concerned with understanding the integration mechanisms that the beetles use to gain entry into the ants' nests. In return, I will supply gas, transportation, lodging (tents), and a bountiful storehouse of entomological knowledge, as well as sharing with you some of the most breathtaking areas of the United States (sorry, I am unable to provide research assistant stipends). I will be traveling from Lawrence, Kansas through these areas from May 6-20 and from June 6 - July 6. If you are interested in participating in some or all of this project, email me directly and I will give you the details of the study as well as answer any questions you may have. If you are unable to participate in the project, but know of others who may be, please pass this information on to them. Similarly, if you are on faculty at a university and wouldn't mind helping out, please print this out and post it on your departmental bulletin boards or make your students aware of this opportunity. Thanks a lot! James Danoff-Burg Snow Entomological Museum University of Kansas Lawrence, Kansas 66045 JIMDB@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu (internet) JIMDB@UKANVAX (bitnet) 913-749-1034 913-864-3309-- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Danoff-Burg (Snow Museum, Univ. of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045) Bitnet: JIMDB@UKANVAX Internet:jimdb@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu "Myrmecophiles-R-Us" From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Thu Mar 11 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!UCONNVM.bitnet!PIGLIUCC From: PIGLIUCC@UCONNVM.bitnet (Massimo Pigliucci) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Lyapunov exponents Message-ID: <9303121544.AA25955@net.bio.net> Date: 12 Mar 93 15:40:10 GMT Sender: daemon@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 79 Dear Nettters, a few weeks ago I posted a message on this network looking for references to software dealing with the determination of Lyapunov exponents for the study of chaos in experimental data. I also asked in general for software dealing with non-linear dynamics. I'd like to share the results of this search, given that many people have expressed the desire to be kept informed about it. I added also software packages of which I was already aware. 1) TraX, distributed by Exeter Software, 100 North Country Rd., Setauket NY 11733. This is a comprehensive package developed by V.V. Levitin that deals with simulation of theoretical models using a variety of NLD techniques. It can display time series, phase plots, obtain bifurcation diagrams, compute Poincare` sections, Lyapunov exponents and maximu-return map. The manual is not easy to understan and far from complete. Very good graphics options, underutilized because of the lack of a printer interface (you can export your results as an ASCII file). It costs around $250. 2) Insite, distributed by Insite software, P.O. Box 9662, Berkeley, CA 94709. Written by T.S. Parker, it is basically the companion to the highly technical, but very well written, Parker & Chua, "Practical numerical algorithms for chaotic systems", Springer-Verlag. It's a powerful piece of software, that requires some familiarity with programming and with NLD theory in general. It comes for about $400 (to which, however, you have to add the costs of a C compiler, a MetaWindows metagraphics program and Metagraphics libraries). 3) Specific on Lyapunov exponents: Wolf et al. (Physyca 16D, 1985) published the listing - in Fortran - of two programs, one for models, the second for experimental data series. Wolf (currently at the Physics Department, The Cooper Union, Cooper Square, New York NY 10003) has been so kind to send me un updated copy in Fortran, C and executable version for PCs. The program comes with a good manual, for free (besides expendes). 4) Still on Lyapunov exponents: Stephen Ellner has also been so kind as to give me access to his files via e-mail (he is at the Biomathematics program, Dept. of Statistics, N.C. State University, Raleigh, NC 27695). His program is based on the algorithm published in Nychka et al. (Journal of the Royal Statistical Society B54, 1992). 5) Alan Hastings (Division of Environmental Studies & Institute of Theoretical Dynamics, University of California, Davis CA 95616) has sent me a copy of a review on chaos in ecology to be published on the Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics. The MS is plenty of references to methodological papers on chaos theory. 6) Wolf (see above) is also author of an educational software called "Chaos simulations", distributed for $70 by Physics Academic Software, Dept. of Physics, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695. The same publishers also distributes other two titles of interest: Chaos demonstrations and Chaotic dynamics workbench, both at $70 (each). 7) Finally (and that was the purpose of it all), I just finished a methodological review on the subject. Anybody interested in receiving the manuscript on the "nuts and bolts" of NLD, please give me a call, drop me a note, or send me a bit. I hope this info is going to be useful to someone. Chaos be with you. (Massimo Pigliucci) ********************************************************************** MASSIMO PIGLIUCCI DEPARTMENT OF ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY UNIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT, STORRS CT 06269 PHONE: 203-486-4372 / FAX: 203-486-6364 BITNET: PIGLIUCC@UCONNVM / INTERNET: PIGLIUCC@UCONNVM.UCONN.EDU "THIS IS BECOMING REALLY INSIGNIFICANT". "NOT ENOUGH". (SAMUEL BECKETT, WAITING FOR GODOT) ********************************************************************** From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Tue Mar 16 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!agate!spool.mu.edu!uwm.edu!ogicse!das-news.harvard.edu!husc-news.harvard.edu!husc10.harvard.edu!robison1 From: robison1@husc10.harvard.edu (Keith Robison) Newsgroups: sci.bio,bionet.general,bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: What is locus? Message-ID: <1993Mar17.115057.21745@husc3.harvard.edu> Date: 17 Mar 93 16:50:55 GMT References: <1993Mar17.105245.22056@reks.uia.ac.be> Followup-To: sci.bio Organization: Harvard University Science Center Lines: 19 Xref: biosci sci.bio:2498 bionet.general:4306 bionet.population-bio:392 Nntp-Posting-Host: husc10.harvard.edu I am forwarding this to the bionet groups in hopes that it will generate some interesting discussion. Follow-ups should show up in sci.bio. Keith R. robison@biosun.harvard.edu In article <1993Mar17.105245.22056@reks.uia.ac.be> Przemko Tylzanowski writes: >Hi netters! > >I would like to ask this question about locus. It came up during one of lab discussions and we could not resolv it. Here it goes: What is the definition of a locus? Is it a functional one (collagen locus etc) or is it positional one (as in case of RFLPs that may identify a locus). In the former case one could not talk about gene locus if the function of that gene is unknown. One could just talk about its position on the chromosome, with respect to other genes etc. >In the latter case, in principle, even a single base could be defining a locus. >Various textbooks are most unhelpful in our quest for the answer. >So... Anyone out there??? >ThanX a lot >Przemko > > > > From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Tue Mar 16 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!agate!spool.mu.edu!sdd.hp.com!network.ucsd.edu!news.service.uci.edu!nntpsrv From: steve@fisher.bio.uci.edu (Steve Frank) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Population Bio Position at Univ California, Irvine Message-ID: <2BA79A2B.2311@news.service.uci.edu> Date: 17 Mar 93 21:37:48 GMT Reply-To: steve@fisher.bio.uci.edu (Steve Frank) Lines: 158 Nntp-Posting-Host: fisher.bio.uci.edu ECOLOGY/POPULATION BIOLOGY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, IRVINE ASSISTANT/ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR The Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of California, Irvine solicits applications for a tenure-track (assistant professor) or tenured (associate professor) position in the field of Ecology. The Department will consider applications from all outstanding candidates in behavioral, population, or community ecology. The successful applicant will be expected to participate in both the undergraduate and graduate teaching programs in Ecology. Review of applications will begin on March 22, 1993. Please submit curriculum vitae, description of research and teaching interests, and the names, addresses and phone numbers of at least three referees to: Ecology Search Committee, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Irvine, CA 92717-0001. UCI is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer committed to excellence through diversity. -------------------------------------------------------------------- We have recently been given permission to recruit for an Assistant or Associate Professor of Ecology (see enclosed ad submitted to Science). Although our search is intended to be very broad, we are particularly interested in finding an individual who excels in field experimental approaches to ecological problems. We seek your help in locating outstanding young scholars who would be interested in joining an active, dynamic department. We are particularly anxious to have your help in identifying qualified women and minority candidates. We will be able to offer the successful candidate an excellent setting within which to build a career. Our Department consists of 25 faculty interested in ecology, evolution and comparative organismic biology (see enclosed list). We are moving into newly renovated laboratory and office quarters near a new biomedical library that will be completed in 1994. The University of California, Irvine, although located in an urban area with access to an excellent array of cultural activities, is within a short drive of a number of natural habitats including deserts, chaparral, montane woodlands and coastal and island ecosystems. Opportunities for field research also abound on the more than 30 reserves managed by the Natural Reserve System of the University of California. For further information, please do not hesitate to contact George Hunt, Chair of the Search Committee: Office Phone - (714) 856-6322, Message Phone (714) 856-6006, Home Phone (714) 497-1914, Fax (714)725-2181. Thank you very much for your help with our search. Sincerely, George L. Hunt, Jr. Chair, Ecology Search Committee ----------------------------------------------------------------------- ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY FACULTY M.C. ANDERSEN: quantitative ecology. P.R. ATSATT: plant ecology and evolution. F.J. AYALA: population genetics and evolutionary biology. A.F. BENNETT: environmental physiology; physiological ecology. T.J. BRADLEY: comparative and evolutionary physiology. N.T. BURLEY: behavioral ecology; sexual selection, social organization and communication D.R. CAMPBELL: plant population biology. F.L. CARPENTER: community ecology. W.M. FITCH, Chair: molecular evolution. S.A. FRANK: social behavior and evolutionary genetics. A.G. GIBBS: comparative physiology and biochemistry; arthropod cuticle lipids and cell membranes J.L. GRAVES, JR.: physiological aspects of evolutionarily postponed senescence in Drosophila. J.W. HICKS: comparative physiology of circulation and gas exchange R.R. HUDSON: theoretical population genetics and molecular evolution. G.L. HUNT: behavioral ecology; marine ornithology. R.K. JOSEPHSON: muscle performance and its determinants. H. KOOPOWITZ: evolution in primitive nervous systems; conservation biology. G.V. LAUDER: functional morphology. R.E. MACMILLEN physiological animal ecology. L.D. MUELLER: theoretical and empirical studies of density-dependent natural selection. E. RODRIGUEZ: chemical ecology of plant-animal interactions; evolution and function of natural products in desert plants. M.R. ROSE: evolution of life history, fitness components, and senescence in Drosophila; the evolution of parasitic DNA, sex, and species barriers. G.C. STEPHENS: comparative animal physiology. A.E. WEIS: evolutionary ecology of plant-insect interactions; plant population biology. S.G. WELLER: plant population biology; evolution of plant reproductive systems. ---------------------------------------------------------- Steven Frank | Tel: 714-725-2244 Dept. of Ecology and | Fax: 714-725-2181 Evolutionary Biology | email: safrank@uci.edu Univ. of California | bitnt: safrank@uci.bitnet Irvine, CA 92717 | From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Thu Mar 18 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!daresbury!daresbury!news From: GENUSTL@FRMOP11.CNUSC.FR (Patrick Berrebi) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: EEC Post doc position available. Message-ID: <1993Mar19.142641.22265@gserv1.dl.ac.uk> Date: 19 Mar 93 15:22:02 GMT Sender: list-admin@daresbury.ac.uk Distribution: bionet Lines: 33 Original-To: biojobs@UK.AC.DARESBURY Original-Resent-Message-Id: <9303191426.AA22230@gserv1> from FRMOP11.CNUSC.FR by UKACRL.BITNET (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 1758; Fri, 19 Mar 93 14: 26:03 GMT Original-Resent-Date: Fri, 19 Mar 93 15:25:38 GMT Original-Resent-To: pop-bio@UK.AC.DARESBURY Original-Resent-From: GENUSTL@FR.CNUSC.FRMOP11 2-YEAR POST-DOCTORAL POSITION AVAILABLE IN FISH POPULATION GENETICS (EEC-ENVIRONMENT PROGRAM) AT MONTPELLIER, FRANCE. Les phenomenes d'introgression entre taxons differencies sont un des themes centraux du Laboratoire Genome et Populations. L'un des sujets de recherche est la zone hybride barbeaux (poissons, cyprinides) ou Barbus barbus et Barbus meridionalis s'introgressent. Le fort desequilibre de linkage observe et l'etroitesse de la zone nous a permis de la classer parmi les zones de tension (versu Barton). Pour ameliorer la comprehension des phenomenes contre-selectifs qui se deroulent en son centre, il est necessaire de disposer de marqueurs neutres en quantite suffisante, tels que les VNTR micro-satellites. Nous prevoyons un contrat de deux annees pour un stagiaire post-doctorant possedant un savoir faire conceptuel et methodologique en genetique moleculaire des populations. Le stage debuterait en juin ou en octobre 1993, comprenant une premiere phase d'identification des marqueurs micro-satellites (clonage et tests de polymorphisme) et une seconde phase d'application a la zone hybride barbeaux, en collaboration avec les chercheurs qui y travaillent deja. Renseignements et C.V. @: Dr. P. BERREBI Laboratoire Genome et Populations Universite Montpellier II case 063, place E. Bataillon 34095 MONTPELLIER Cedex 05, FRANCE tel (33) 67 14 37 33 - fax (33) 67 14 45 54 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Fri Mar 19 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!GENETICS.WASHINGTON.EDU!joe From: joe@GENETICS.WASHINGTON.EDU (Joe Felsenstein) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: PHYLIP version 3.5 released Message-ID: <9303201926.AA00166@evolution.genetics.washington.edu> Date: 20 Mar 93 18:26:56 GMT Sender: daemon@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 34 Versions 3.5c and 3.5p of PHYLIP, the Phylogeny Inference Package, have now been released. PHYLIP is a free package of programs for inferring phylogenies, available as C or Pascal source code and documentation, and in four forms of executables: (i) for 386 and 486 systems under PCDOS, (ii) for 386 and 486 systems under Windows, (iii) for non-386 and non-486 PCDOS systems, and (iv) for Macintosh systems. The C source code will also compile easily on most workstations and mainframes that have a C compiler. PHYLIP has been distributed by me since 1980, with over 2000 registered installations. New features include programs to compute protein sequence distances, to interactively modify a phylogeny, and to compute likelihoods in coalescent models from samples of genealogies. Most programs in the C version no longer have arbitrary limits on the numbers of sites of or species. Many other new features have been added as well, such as new models for variation of evolutionary rates among sites in the DNA likelihood programs. PHYLIP is available by anonymous ftp from evolution.genetics.washington.edu (IP number 128.95.12.41) in directory pub/phylip. Users who cannot get it this way can also send enough formatted diskettes, which will be returned with the particular form of the package and its documentation written on them. Contact me (preferably by electronic mail) for details of the diskette distribution or further information about anonymous ftp distribution. This is the last version that will have Pascal source code; future releases will be in C, and users are urged to use the C source code of 3.5 if possible. Thanks to many users for reporting bugs in the 3.5 beta release which has been available informally since January. ----- Joe Felsenstein, Dept. of Genetics, Univ. of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA --> Internet: joe@genetics.washington.edu (IP number 128.95.12.41) Bitnet/EARN: felsenst@uwavm From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Mon Mar 22 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!bhassan From: bhassan@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Bassem A Hassan) Newsgroups: bionet.molbio.bio-matrix,bionet.population-bio,bionet.molbio.hiv Subject: Re: DidYouKnow... Message-ID: <1993Mar23.231335.11253@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> Date: 23 Mar 93 23:13:35 GMT References: <1993Mar23.051524.9685@midway.uchicago.edu> <93Mar23.165208edt.791@ Sender: news@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu Distribution: usa Organization: The Ohio State University Lines: 7 Xref: biosci bionet.molbio.bio-matrix:389 bionet.population-bio:399 bionet.molbio.hiv:195 Nntp-Posting-Host: bottom.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu This article has appeared on every news group I've read the last couple of days. I think somebody is just posting it all over the place. If we ignore it , we'll get rid of it! peace bass. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Mon Mar 22 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!utcsri!relay.cs.toronto.edu!neuron.ai.toronto.edu!ai.toronto.edu!steeg From: steeg@cs.toronto.edu ("Evan W. Steeg") Newsgroups: bionet.molbio.bio-matrix,bionet.population-bio,bionet.molbio.hiv,bionet.plants,bionet.molbio.gdb,bionet.virology,bionet.molbio.rapd Subject: Re: DidYouKnow... Message-ID: <93Mar23.165208edt.791@neuron.ai.toronto.edu> Date: 23 Mar 93 21:52:25 GMT References: <1993Mar23.051524.9685@midway.uchicago.edu> Distribution: usa Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto Lines: 32 Xref: biosci bionet.molbio.bio-matrix:387 bionet.population-bio:398 bionet.molbio.hiv:194 bionet.plants:1071 bionet.molbio.gdb:54 bionet.virology:60 bionet.molbio.rapd:7 In article <1993Mar23.051524.9685@midway.uchicago.edu> buzy@midway.uchicago.edu writes: >Today Japanese companies own the 7/11 store chain, Dunlop, Universal Pictures, >Columbia Pictures, Loews Theaters, MCA Home Entertainment, Tri-Star Pictures, >CBS Records, Columbia Records, Spencers stores, Ciniplex Odeon (a big part), >Firestone Tires and many many more very large US companies while foreigners >are prevented from owning any important Japanese concerns. Ordinary Japanese >are kind wonderful people, but what their companies and government are doing >is racist and wrong. > > To find out more about this (and get a more complete list of the above), >read (JAPANYES) "Does America Say Yes To Japan?";Leclerc 1992,93 which is >available on INTERNET. (most recent edition is v031993). This thoughtfully >written and important article has been circulating widely in many of America's >biggest corporations & universities like IBM & Harvard. When you read it (it >takes about 30 minutes), you'll see why. Let's *please* keep the (racism-tinged) political diatribes out of the bionet newsgroups, eh? (I will note in passing how it continues to amaze and amuse me that my fellow Americans just go into spin cycle over the simple fact that Japanese companies make better products at better prices - how *dare* they?! :-) -- Evan -- Evan W. Steeg (416) 978-5182 steeg@ai.toronto.edu (CSnet,UUCP,Bitnet) Dept of Computer Science steeg@ai.utoronto (other Bitnet) University of Toronto, steeg@ai.toronto.cdn (EAN X.400) Toronto, Canada M5S 1A4 {seismo,watmath}!ai.toronto.edu!steeg From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Mon Mar 22 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!NET.BIO.NET!kristoff From: kristoff@NET.BIO.NET (David Kristofferson) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: BIOSCI/bionet Frequently Asked Questions Message-ID: <9303231000.AA29081@net.bio.net> Date: 23 Mar 93 10:00:03 GMT Sender: kristoff@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 16 New users of BIOSCI/bionet may want to read the "Frequently Asked Questions" or "FAQ" sheet for BIOSCI. The FAQ provides details on how to participate in these forums and is available for anonymous FTP from net.bio.net [134.172.2.69] in pub/BIOSCI/biosci.FAQ. It may also be requested by sending e-mail to biosci@net.bio.net (use plain English for your request). The FAQ is also posted on the first of each month to the newsgroup BIONEWS/bionet.announce immediately following the posting of the BIOSCI information sheet. Sincerely, Dave Kristofferson BIOSCI/bionet Manager kristoff@net.bio.net From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Thu Mar 25 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!UCONNVM.bitnet!PIGLIUCC From: PIGLIUCC@UCONNVM.bitnet (Massimo Pigliucci) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: inter-environment genetic correlations Message-ID: <9303262240.AA21280@net.bio.net> Date: 26 Mar 93 22:38:56 GMT Sender: daemon@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 86 Dear PopBio-netters, we would like to open a discussion on an issue regarding the quantitative genetics approach to the study of evolution of genotype x environment interactions. In particular, we are interested in the approach used by Via and Lande (1985) and Via (1987) (following a suggestion of Falconer (1952): these authors extend the concept of a genetic correlation to the case of one character expressed in two or more environments. Simply put, if we consider the case of two environments, the trait expressed in environment 1 is considered as a different (but genetically correlated) trait from the same character expressed in environment 2. Using this approach, it is possible to extend the work and conclusion on evolution on multiple traits in one environment to the evolution of one trait in multiple environments (in fact, the two cases become identical). However, we have a problem of causality in this respect. Quantitative genetics represents a statistical approach to the study of evolution, treating the underlying mechanistic causes as a black box supposed to be irrelevant to the description of evolutionary trajectories. We do not feel comfortable with this assumption in the first place, but feel that this is even less warranted in the case of multiple environments. The questions are: (i) what causes a genetic correlation between the expression of the same character under two different conditions? (ii) Are there causes of the inter-environment genetic correlation that are unique to this situation (i.e., that do not contribute to the usual genetic correlation between two distinct traits in the same environment)? (iii) If there is more than one cause to the inter- environment correlation, does the knowledge of such causes imply a different long-term dynamics of the evolutionary trajectory? We are not implying that a statistical (i.e., quantitative genetics) description is not able to account for short term predictions of the trajectory, but is it reasonable to extrapolate current conditions - ignoring their causes - to thousands of generations in the future? No statistician would ever project his/her regression line more than a few points beyond the range within which the regression has been derived... We think that: (i) a genetic correlation across environment is caused by - at least - the following components: a) linkage between genes; b) allelic sensitivity (the fact that - even if the two traits are affected by exactly the same genes - these are likely to show a differential response, or "sensitivity", to the two environments, thereby effectively altering their relationship in determining the two traits. These is a sort of "inter- environment" pleiotropy); c) genes being switched on or off between the two environments (a sort of "inter-environment epistasis"). (ii) Allelic sensitivity is unique to the between- environment case; we don't think there is an analogous in the case of two traits expressed within an environment. (iii) This is the bigger incognita: it seems to us that evolution based on allelic sensitivity would be very different from evolution based on genetic switches, or from a combination of the two. For example, the presence of epistatic effects could allow the build up of a regulatory system able to stabilize the phenotype over a range of environments (as opposed to a continuous direct response to the environment caused by allelic sensitivity). Regulatory systems are also able to anticipate environmental conditions based on the coordinate response to cues, which seems to us pretty hard to envision with allelic sensitivity (examples of these are heterophilly in plants, caused by changes in light quality, or metamorphosis in amphibians caused by overcrowding, or SOS response in E.coli caused by DNA damage). Does anybody have comments or suggestions along all three these lines? We would appreciate a little forum on these topics, which seem to us very relevant for the understanding of phenotypic evolution in general. Carl Schlichting & Massimo Pigliucci ***************************************************************** Massimo Pigliucci Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology University of Connecticut, Storrs CT 06269 phone: 203-486-4372 fax: 203-486-6364 bitnet: pigliucc@uconnvm internet: pigliucc@uconnvm.uconn.edu "This is becoming really insignificant". "Not enough". (Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot) ***************************************************************** From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Thu Mar 25 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!WELL.SF.CA.US!mikedean From: mikedean@WELL.SF.CA.US (Mike Merrill) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: population pressure & Africa Message-ID: <199303261337.AA27863@well.sf.ca.us> Date: 26 Mar 93 13:37:09 GMT Sender: daemon@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 27 I have a question for you population biologists and/or anthropologists out there. My background is in journalism, personally. I was reading _The Food Crisis in Prehistory_ by Mark Nathan Cohen yesterday. The book suggests that agriculture was an adaptation to high population densities, allowing a greater number of people to live on a given area of land. One of the incidental points in the book is that the reason that humans migrated into the colder regions of the world, such as northern Europe, was population pressure. As I understand it, competition for limited resources led to people moving into less hospitable climes, where, for example, fire was first used extensively. Now my question is this: my understanding is that humans originated in Africa, and moved out from there. Is it the case that intraspecific competition for limited resources, or population pressure, led the ancestors of Europeans, Asians and Native Americans to move out of Africa? If so, about when would this have been? Mike Merrill Buffalo, NY mikedean@well.sf.ca.us From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Fri Mar 26 22:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!neoucom.edu!news.ysu.edu!psuvm!cunyvm!yvax.byu.edu!farmerj From: farmerj@yvax.byu.edu Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: What is a locus? Message-ID: <1993Mar26.153414.1660@yvax.byu.edu> Date: 26 Mar 93 22:34:14 GMT Organization: Brigham Young University Lines: 12 Words whould retain their original meaning unless there is a very good reason to change them. According to Glossary of Genetics and Cytogenetics by Rieger, Michaelis and Green, the word "locus" was originally defined by Mo rgan, Sturtevant, Muller, and Bridges in 1915 to mean "the position of a gene on the genetic map. Allelic genes are situated at identical loci in homologous linkage structures (chromosomes)...." Unfortunately, the new edition of their work (Glossary of Genetics) is much more equivocal. James Farmer Brigham Young University un From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Mar 28 23:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!NIU.BITNET!T80SMS1 From: T80SMS1@NIU.BITNET Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: RE: inter-environment genetic correlations Message-ID: <9303291538.AA03860@net.bio.net> Date: 29 Mar 93 15:37:00 GMT Sender: daemon@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 51 I have to wade in here. Carl (Hi!) has heard a bit of this before. I will give the short answers, long ones are available if there is sufficient interest. (1) All of the mechanisms that Carl and Massimo propose are probably correct, as well as others not listed. This is a theme that I have been pushing for years. (2) If we go looking for mechanisms I think that it is important to keep in mind at what level we expect the environmental effects to occur at, at the level of gene transcription, translation, among biochemical pathways, or epigenetic interactions during development. In this regard it becomes difficult to speak of this issue in the abstract. It is much better to have a particular set of traits in mind. Maybe one place to start would be to come up with a short list of candidates that may represent each of the above levels of control. An important distinction to keep in mind are discontinuous traits (eg, heterophylly) vs continuous traits (eg, thorax size). I have argued elsewhere (next issue of Ann. Rev. Ecol. Syst., blatant plug :-), that mathematically they can be treated equivalently. However, this does not mean that they are mechanistically equivalent. If I had to make predictions, discontinuous traits are more likely to be controlled at the gene transcription level while continuous traits at the epigenetic level (obviously I am being deliberately extremest here ;-). (3) Keep in mind that quantitative genetic models were NEVER meant to be accurate for thousands of generations. Technically, they are accurate for ONE generation only since heritabilities and covariances will change with shifts in gene frequencies. Only for the special case of very weak selection and sufficiently high mutational input to provide new variation do they predict long-term trends. In fact, we know from experimental evidence (response plateaus, non-uniform responses, non-linear responses, etc) that these models are just good first-order approximations. They are very useful, but should be placed in the same category as physicist's frictionless surfaces as idealizations. Again, I have been pushing for more realistic models, both quantitative genetic and genomic ones. Sam *+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+* * Samuel M. Scheiner + * * Department of Biological Sciences + Education is a * * Northern Illinois University + * * DeKalb, Illinois 60115 + subversive activity! * * Phone: (815) 753-7847 + * * Fax: (815) 753-0461 + * * Bitnet: t80sms1@niu + * * Internet: t80sms1@mvs.cso.niu.edu + * *+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+* From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Mon Mar 29 23:00:00 1993 Path: biosci!UAMONT.EDU!zeide From: zeide@UAMONT.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Teaching math to ecologists Message-ID: <0096A482.45568440.19038@uamont.edu> Date: 30 Mar 93 17:49:52 GMT Sender: daemon@net.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 270 In brief: Dr. Rolfe Leary and I are reviewing applications of differential, difference, and related equations (integro- differential, differential-difference, integral, partial differential) for modeling population dynamics of ecosystems, especially forest stands. If you have written on this topic or can inform us of interesting results obtained by others, we would greatly appreciate receiving a reprint or complete citation from you. This review is the first step of a larger project, writing a text for undergraduate ecologists and foresters. We believe that ecologists, rather than mathematicians, are better equipped to convey the beauty and relevance of mathematics to our students. We hope that our text will be more inspiring than those written by professional mathematicians. Yet, it will not be just a cookbook spiced with ecological applications. Our approach to this project is outlined below. ------------------------------------------------------ We, ecologists, differ greatly in our attitude toward mathematics. (By mathematics I mean everything above high school arithmetic, algebra, and cookbooked defensive statistics.) Many ecologists hate all this differentiation and integration, maybe because they fail to understand it. For the same reason, others, like Darwin, hold math in awe. Some of us even dabble with differential equations, again usually without knowing much about what we are doing. Two things unite us. First, many ecologists and practically all foresters took calculus and were introduced to the elements of differential equations as college students. Second, very few of us make use of this, the most powerful tool of science our in research or practice. A stupendous experiment has been going on for many years: an attempt to instill mathematical knowledge in students of biology and its applied branches such as forestry. This experiment has been conducted with an awful number of replications and variants in hundreds of institutions of higher education throughout the world. It makes sense to pause and look at the results of this experiment. No statistical analysis is required to see that math education of ecologists has been a failure. This problem is not limited to the United States. I received all my degrees in Moscow, Russia, and can confirm that, although mathematical training there was more vigorous and extensive, it was also a complete waste. I retained nothing about calculus from college. If I know anything about it, it is because later on I learned calculus anew on my own. My interest was sparked by a very simple calculus text for votech schools which I happened across during a boring vacation. While reading and even enjoying this elementary book, I was amazed that I had forgotten even introductory concepts. The problem was not with my memory. More than just passive forgetting was involved. It was as if the brain actively, though subconsciously, had expunged all those dry abstract concepts as antithetical to our ecological vocation. Yet, these concepts, after surmounting the barrier of initial rejection, appear as the most beautiful and relevant prerequisites of thinking in any science, ecology including. Why have mathematicians failed to teach us? There is a genuine lack of understanding between ecologists and mathematicians. It appears not only in teaching but in research as well. A biologist's way of thinking is different from that of a mathematician and, despite numerous attempts, examples of productive cooperation between biologists and mathematicians are as rare as the number of ecologists who mastered math as a university student. Those who create math and regard it as an end in itself are not necessarily the best at using it as a means to an end. Analysis of this problem deserves a special inquiry, rather than offhand remarks, because it may help to find better ways of communication. Basically, there are two explanations. One is that in principle biology, unlike physics, cannot be explained in mathematical terms. These areas of knowledge belong to two inimical and mutually incomprehensible worlds. According to this explanation, when mathematicians venture to say something about biology, they are always wrong or, at best, irrelevant. Trofim Lysenko was the best known champion of this view in the fifties and Ernst Mayr is at present. Mayr, an outstanding biologist who upon retirement turned to the history and philosophy of science, criticizes math in the course of his struggle with what he calls typological thinking. Instead, he advocates population thinking that "is a peculiarly biological concept, alien to the thinking of the physical scientist" (Mayr 1982, p. 487). Biology and historical sciences, he believes, deal with systems too complex to be expressed in mathematical formulas. Only misconceptions" can be produced as a result of "ill-advised application of mathematics" in biology. Equally expressive are comments like "It might be mentioned, incidentally, how misleading it is to refer to mathematics as the "queen of the sciences"." His thorough knowledge of the history of science allowed him to state that "even Kant, by 1790, had abandoned his subservience to mathematics. If the invalidity of the mathematical ideal of science had not been obvious before, it certainly became so with the publication of the Origin of Species" (Mayr 1982, p. 41). Besides these philosophical issues, Mayr demonstrated, using the argument between Darwin and Lord Kelvin, that biologists might be better at calculations than physicists. Though less knowledgeable and articulate than Mayr, Lysenko was more effective: he simply prohibited all biologically-related math. Books on the subject were recalled from all libraries in the USSR and burned (not publicly). Teachers of this criminal discipline were exiled, fired, or, after proper public repentance, forgiven. It is curious that, despite great differences between the Harvard professor and Stalin's henchman, both used similar derisive terminology when referring to Mendel's typological theory of inheritance. Mayr calls it "bean-bag genetics", while Lysenko dubbed it "peas' laws." An alternative explanation of our poor comprehension of math is less radical. It deals with the shortcomings of disciples rather than disciplines. These weaknesses are relative. They can be viewed as opposite sides of the assets of the respective disciplines. Ecologists have a better, though intuitive, grasp of complicated reality such as ecosystems. But their theories and explanations sometimes lack coherence and discipline. The strict rigor and precision, the hallmark of a mathematician, when applied to ecological problems, too often deteriorates into a concern about technicalities. These details appear irrelevant to an ecologist for whom math is not the end, but only a means. We often casually say that sizes of plants or animals are normally distributed. This statement would not go unnoticed by a mathematician. "Do you really mean that some rabbits have a negative weight?" - he or she would ask. A more serious predicament arises when we try to discuss our research. "Your problem is poorly defined" (or "ill-posed") is the most common response by a mathematician. As a rule, the cooperation stops here. In rare cases when it continues, a mathematician using impeccably correct methods will produce an outlandish answer, while an ecologist employing hopelessly faulty reasoning (and elusive intuition) will produce something more sensible. The difference in the level of development of ecology and math does not foster understanding and cooperation. Ecosystems might be extremely complex and their explanation may require very sophisticated math, much of which is yet to be discovered. However, the present extent of our knowledge of ecological complexity is limited. From a mathematician's viewpoint, our greatest achievements so far have been the comprehension of exponentiation (as is the case with natural selection) and elementary combinatorics (Mendel's genetics). This disparity between developmental levels makes cooperation tenuous. Regardless of the reasons and explanations for this lack of mutual understanding, we must recognize that it does exist and that we should do something about it. What should we do? If we have failed to learn from mathematicians, we should try something else: teach ourselves. Ecologically-inspired math is too important to be confined to esoteric graduate courses. It should be taught right at the beginning of our university education (and even prior) by mathematically-minded ecologists. Mathematicians will remain indispensable as consultants. They are at their best when they teach future mathematicians rather than biologists and engineers. To start with, we need to write a good text for our undergraduates. Actually, many texts should be written in order to create the competitive environment needed to facilitate the evolution of our mathematical education. While there are decent books on mathematical ecology for graduate biology students, undergraduate texts are commonly written by mathematicians. Our text will be devoted to undergraduate ecological mathematics rather than mathematical ecology. In other words, the stress will be on teaching math using ecology as a spring board. We will consider tree growth and animal behavior only to expose the beauty and utility of logical trees and mathematical animals such as derivatives, integrals, and absolute truth. To apply math, future ecologists will need to master more than just a few useful tricks such as the Taylor series. Math is a method for expressing ideas - our own. This method is distinguished from others by an unsurpassed discipline of thinking. The problem is to develop mathematical imagery and the ability to discern the substance of the studied