911±¬ÁÏÍø

Title of Debate:ÌýOn the Origins of the Domestic Dog

Speaker:Ìý Professor Love Dalen,ÌýSwedish Museum of Natural History
Title: Recalibrating canid evolution using ancient DNA

Abstract:ÌýMost researchers agree that the wolf is the ancestor of the dog, and that dogs were domesticated sometime during the last Ice Age. However, there is considerable disagreement on where and how domestication happened, as well as exactly when the divergence between dogs and wolves took place. The aim of this talk is to outline how recent genomic data from Pleistocene canid remains now allows us to start disentangling the history of dogs and wolves in much better detail.Ìý

Speaker: ProfessorÌýGreger Larson,ÌýUniversity of Oxford
Title: On theÌýImpossibilityÌýof Dogs

Abstract:ÌýThe earth is home to 150ÌýmillionÌýdogs. And dogs were unequivocally the first domestic plant or animal. Despite their ongoing pivotal role in human history, we don’t really understand where and when and how many times they were domesticated. In this talk I will focus on why we still know nothing and describe efforts underway that will lead to a satisfying answer.

Title of Debate:Ìý60 Years of Central Dogma

Speaker:Ìý ProfessorÌýAoifeÌýMcLysaght, Trinty College Dublin
Title: Turning noise into information

Abstract:TBC

Speaker: ProfessorÌýMatthew Cobb,ÌýUniversity of Manchester
Title:ÌýWhat did Crick’s ‘central dogma’ really mean?ÌýÌýÌý

Abstract:60 years ago, Francis Crick’s article ‘On protein synthesis’ was published, based on lecture he gave the previous year. I will explore what he was trying to do in the lecture, andÌýin particular whatÌýexactly he meant by the ‘central dogma’, the extent to which this was a change over previous ways of understanding what is in a gene, and how his ideas have been misinterpreted and misunderstood, in particular in textbooks.Ìý

Title of Debate: The next stage of Human Evolution

Speaker: Arizona State University
Title: The future of human evolution: we are what we eat if we survive the pathogens we keep?

Abstract: We can gain insight into the future of human evolution by looking at our past. Research in my laboratory focuses on evolutionary history and understanding how humans and other primates have adapted to their environments, including their disease and dietary environments. I will discuss how we use genetic data to understand how diet and disease have shaped our genomes and affected our population history.

Speaker: University of Turku
Title: Natural selection – now!

Abstract:ÌýThe Industrial Revolution and the accompanying nutritional, epidemiological and demographic changes have profoundly changed human ecology and biology, leading to major shifts for example in our disease patterns, lifespan, family size or age at puberty. These recent social and cultural adaptations have cast doubt on the continued relevance of Darwinian selection in humans – we now have modern medical care and effective contraceptive methods so does that mean evolution by natural selection has stopped? I will discuss how mismatches between past adaptations and the current environment mean that gene variants linked to higher fitness in the past may now predispose us to non-communicable diseases, such as Alzheimer disease, cancer and coronary artery disease. Moreover, in both traditional and industrialized societies, differences among individuals still lead to selection favouring certain heritable traits because although survival to old age can be high, not everyone has the same family size and many forego reproduction altogether. In line with this, increasing evidence suggests that the transition to modernity has also altered the direction and intensity of natural selection acting on many traits, with important implications for public and global health.

Title of Debate: Mathematical Modelling in Evolution

Speaker: Steve Frank - University of California, Irvine
Title:ÌýMicrobial metabolism: demography shapes biochemistry

Speaker: Sally Otto - University of British Columbia
Title:ÌýLinking levels of selection with genetic modifiers