Download or read book Genetic Reconstruction of the Past written by Henry A. Erlich and published by . This book was released on 2024 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The same DNA technology that allows the analysis of a hair or tiny blood spot at a crime scene also enables sequencing the DNA of a bone fragment from a Neanderthal skeleton. Comparing the DNA sequences of different samples and comparing the frequency of specific genetic variants in different populations is a critical part of both forensic and evolutionary investigations. These two fields share a common goal: solving historical mysteries. The book discusses the intrinsic human curiosity about our origins and the desire to solve crimes and seek justice and how the recent emergence of DNA analysis has transformed our ability to address these universal human aspirations. The unifying theme of the book is the recently developed capacity to use DNA sequence information to make inferences about historical events.
Download or read book Genetic Reconstruction of the Past written by Henry A Erlich and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-12 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The same DNA technology that allows the analysis of a hair or tiny blood spot at a crime scene also enables sequencing the DNA of a bone fragment from a Neanderthal skeleton. Comparing the DNA sequences of different samples and comparing the frequency of specific genetic variants in different populations is a critical part of both forensic and evolutionary investigations. These two fields share a common goal: solving historical mysteries. The book discusses the intrinsic human curiosity about our origins and the desire to solve crimes and seek justice and how the recent emergence of DNA analysis has transformed our ability to address these universal human aspirations. The unifying theme of the book is the recently developed capacity to use DNA sequence information to make inferences about historical events. Part One is a discussion of how DNA analysis can reconstruct the recent past, in particular, the events that transpired at the scene of a crime. Part Two is a discussion of the application of DNA analysis to reconstructing the ancient past, using DNA sequences from human samples as well as from fossil remains to study the evolution of the human species and the historical relationships among contemporary and extinct human populations. Erlich discuss how he, along with his colleagues at Cetus Corp in the mid-1980s developed the PCR (polymerase chain reaction) technology of specific DNA amplification, a method of synthesizing millions of copies of a specific targeted DNA sequence and applied it to address forensic and evolutionary questions. It is this capacity, that has transformed both forensic science and evolutionary biology and has led to both the identification-and exoneration-of criminal suspects and a deeper understanding of human evolution. These techniques, now widely used, were applied in the first DNA criminal case, the first exoneration case, and the first identification of a missing person. Discussions on the history and the many remaining contentious issues in forensic DNA analysis in Part One are organized around several specific criminal cases, while the book tries to convey the spirit of "doing science."
Download or read book A Genetic Reconstruction of the History of the Population of the Iberian Peninsula written by Jaume Bertranpetit and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 17 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Historico genetic Theory of Culture written by Günter Dux and published by transcript Verlag. This book was released on 2014-03-31 with total page 415 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book focuses on the modern understanding of human life-forms as constructs that followed an evolutionary history. The author thus finds science confronted with two questions: firstly, how the transgression of the virtual threshold between natural and cultural history was possible, secondly, how the socio-cultural constructs were able to develop in the course of history the way they did. The discussion concentrates on the problem of determining a processual logic in the development of societal structures as well as in the development of cognition. The focus of attention is the historico-genetic reconstruction of cognition. The book was originally published in German as »Historisch-genetische Theorie der Kultur« (Weilerswist 2000: Velbrück).
Download or read book Who Wrote the Book of Life written by Lily E. Kay and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a detailed history of one of the most important and dramatic episodes in modern science, recounted from the novel vantage point of the dawn of the information age and its impact on representations of nature, heredity, and society. Drawing on archives, published sources, and interviews, the author situates work on the genetic code (1953-70) within the history of life science, the rise of communication technosciences (cybernetics, information theory, and computers), the intersection of molecular biology with cryptanalysis and linguistics, and the social history of postwar Europe and the United States. Kay draws out the historical specificity in the process by which the central biological problem of DNA-based protein synthesis came to be metaphorically represented as an information code and a writing technologyand consequently as a book of life. This molecular writing and reading is part of the cultural production of the Nuclear Age, its power amplified by the centuries-old theistic resonance of the book of life metaphor. Yet, as the author points out, these are just metaphors: analogies, not ontologies. Necessary and productive as they have been, they have their epistemological limitations. Deploying analyses of language, cryptology, and information theory, the author persuasively argues that, technically speaking, the genetic code is not a code, DNA is not a language, and the genome is not an information system (objections voiced by experts as early as the 1950s). Thus her historical reconstruction and analyses also serve as a critique of the new genomic biopower. Genomic textuality has become a fact of life, a metaphor literalized, she claims, as human genome projects promise new levels of control over life through the meta-level of information: control of the word (the DNA sequences) and its editing and rewriting. But the author shows how the humbling limits of these scriptural metaphors also pose a challenge to the textual and material mastery of the genomic book of life.
Download or read book The History and Geography of Human Genes written by Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 1130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: By mapping the worldwide geographic distribution of the genes, the scientists are now able to chart migrations and, in exploring genetic distance, devise a clock by which to date evolutionary history: the longer two populations are separated, the greater their genetic difference should be.
Download or read book Plant Genomes written by Jean-Nicolas Volff and published by Karger Medical and Scientific Publishers. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 155 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent major advances in the field of comparative genomics and cytogenomics of plants, particularly associated with the completion of ambitious genome projects, have uncovered astonishing facets of the architecture and evolutionary history of plant genomes. The aim of this book was to review these recent developments as well as their implications in our understanding of the mechanisms which drive plant diversity. New insights into the evolution of gene functions, gene families and genome size are presented, with particular emphasis on the evolutionary impact of polyploidization and transposable elements. Knowledge on the structure and evolution of plant sex chromosomes, centromeres and microRNAs is reviewed and updated. Taken together, the contributions by internationally recognized experts present a panoramic overview of the structural features and evolutionary dynamics of plant genomes.This volume of Genome Dynamics will provide researchers, teachers and students in the fields of biology and agronomy with a valuable source of current knowledge on plant genomes.
Download or read book The Tangled Tree written by David Quammen and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2019-08-06 with total page 480 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this New York Times bestseller and longlist nominee for the National Book Award, “our greatest living chronicler of the natural world” (The New York Times), David Quammen explains how recent discoveries in molecular biology affect our understanding of evolution and life’s history. In the mid-1970s, scientists began using DNA sequences to reexamine the history of all life. Perhaps the most startling discovery to come out of this new field—the study of life’s diversity and relatedness at the molecular level—is horizontal gene transfer (HGT), or the movement of genes across species lines. It turns out that HGT has been widespread and important; we now know that roughly eight percent of the human genome arrived sideways by viral infection—a type of HGT. In The Tangled Tree, “the grandest tale in biology….David Quammen presents the science—and the scientists involved—with patience, candor, and flair” (Nature). We learn about the major players, such as Carl Woese, the most important little-known biologist of the twentieth century; Lynn Margulis, the notorious maverick whose wild ideas about “mosaic” creatures proved to be true; and Tsutomu Wantanabe, who discovered that the scourge of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is a direct result of horizontal gene transfer, bringing the deep study of genome histories to bear on a global crisis in public health. “David Quammen proves to be an immensely well-informed guide to a complex story” (The Wall Street Journal). In The Tangled Tree, he explains how molecular studies of evolution have brought startling recognitions about the tangled tree of life—including where we humans fit upon it. Thanks to new technologies, we now have the ability to alter even our genetic composition—through sideways insertions, as nature has long been doing. “The Tangled Tree is a source of wonder….Quammen has written a deep and daring intellectual adventure” (The Boston Globe).
Download or read book Phylogenetic Inference Selection Theory and History of Science written by Anthony William Fairbank Edwards and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-07-19 with total page 553 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seminal papers by A. W. F. Edwards, published together for the first time with commentaries from leading experts to contextualise his contribution.
Download or read book Anthropological Genetics written by Michael H. Crawford and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Volume detailing the effects of the molecular revolution on anthropological genetics and how it redefined the field.
Download or read book Life as We Made It written by Beth Shapiro and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2021-10-19 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the first dog to the first beefalo, from farming to CRISPR, the human history of remaking nature When the 2020 Nobel Prize was awarded to the inventors of CRISPR, the revolutionary gene-editing tool, it underlined our amazing and apparently novel powers to alter nature. But as biologist Beth Shapiro argues in Life as We Made It, this phenomenon isn’t new. Humans have been reshaping the world around us for ages, from early dogs to modern bacteria modified to pump out insulin. Indeed, she claims, reshaping nature—resetting the course of evolution, ours and others’—is the essence of what our species does. In exploring our evolutionary and cultural history, Shapiro finds a course for the future. If we have always been changing nature to help us survive and thrive, then we need to avoid naive arguments about how we might destroy it with our meddling, and instead ask how we can meddle better. Brilliant and insightful, Life as We Made It is an essential book for the decades to come.
Download or read book Life Histories of Genetic Disease written by Andrew J. Hogan and published by Johns Hopkins University Press+ORM. This book was released on 2016-10-30 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A richly detailed history that “uncovers the challenges and limitations of our increasing reliance on genetic data in medical decision making” (Shobita Parthasarathy, author of Building Genetic Medicine). Medical geneticists began mapping the chromosomal infrastructure piece by piece in the 1970s by focusing on what was known about individual genetic disorders. Five decades later, their infrastructure had become an edifice for prevention, allowing expectant parents to test prenatally for hundreds of disease-specific mutations using powerful genetic testing platforms. In this book, Andrew J. Hogan explores how various diseases were “made genetic” after 1960, with the long-term aim of treating and curing them using gene therapy. In the process, he explains, these disorders were located in the human genome and became targets for prenatal prevention, while the ongoing promise of gene therapy remained on the distant horizon. In narrating the history of research that contributed to diagnostic genetic medicine, Hogan describes the expanding scope of prenatal diagnosis and prevention. He draws on case studies of Prader-Willi, fragile X, DiGeorge, and velo-cardio-facial syndromes to illustrate that almost all testing in medical genetics is inseparable from the larger—and increasingly “big data”–oriented—aims of biomedical research. Hogan also reveals how contemporary genetic testing infrastructure reflects an intense collaboration among cytogeneticists, molecular biologists, and doctors specializing in human malformation. Hogan critiques the modern ideology of genetic prevention, which suggests all pregnancies are at risk for genetic disease and should be subject to extensive genomic screening. He examines the dilemmas and ethics of the use of prenatal diagnostic information in an era when medical geneticists and biotechnology companies offer whole genome prenatal screening—essentially searching for any disease-causing mutation. Hogan’s analysis is animated by ongoing scientific and scholarly debates about the extent to which the preventive focus in contemporary medical genetics resembles the aims of earlier eugenicists. Written for historians, sociologists, and anthropologists of science and medicine, as well as bioethics scholars, physicians, geneticists, and families affected by genetic conditions, Life Histories of Genetic Disease is a profound exploration of the scientific culture surrounding malformation and mutation.
Download or read book America Past America Present written by Colin Renfrew and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aspects of the prehistory of the Americas currently remain little understood, with suggested dates for the first human colonization varying widely between 40,000 and 14,000 years ago. In this volume, molecular geneticists and historical linguists debate the evidence for the first peopling of the Americas, and for the subsequent emergence of the remarkable genetic and linguistic diversity still seen among Native Americans to this day. Part I offers a general consideration of the theme of language distribution and genetic variation in human populations with emphasis on the population-specific polymorphism issue. In parts II and III linguistic variation in Native American populations and their accompanying molecular genetic variability are discussed by leading specialists. In the final part unanswered questions in historical linguistics are debated, including the macrofamily problem with particular reference to the postulated but contoversial Amerind family.
Download or read book Ancestral Sequence Reconstruction written by David A Liberles and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007-05-31 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ancestral sequence reconstruction is a technique of growing importance in molecular evolutionary biology and comparative genomics. As a powerful tool for testing evolutionary and ecological hypotheses, as well as uncovering the link between sequence and molecular phenotype, there are potential applications in a range of fields.Ancestral Sequence Reconstruction starts with a historical overview of the field, before discussing the potential applications in drug discovery and the pharmaceutical industry. This is followed by a section on computational methodology, which provides a detailed discussion of the available methods for reconstructing ancestral sequences (including their advantages, disadvantages, and potential pitfalls). Purely computational applications of the technique are then covered, including wholeproteome reconstruction. Further chapters provide a detailed discussion on taking computationally reconstructed sequences and synthesizing them in the laboratory. The book concludes with a description of the scientific questions where experimental ancestral sequence reconstruction has been utilized toprovide insights and inform future research.This research level text provides a first synthesis of the theories, methodologies and applications associated with ancestral sequence recognition, while simultaneously addressing many of the hot topics in the field. It will be of interest and use to both graduate students and researchers in the fields of molecular biology, molecular evolution, and evolutionary bioinformatics.
Download or read book Abstracts of Publications written by National Science Foundation (U.S.). Division of Intergovernmental Science & Public Technology and published by . This book was released on 1967 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Summarizes the publications that have resulted from the activities that have been sponsored in State and local governments and in technologically-oriented institutions around the country in the Intergovernmental Science Program.
Download or read book Human Population Genetics written by John H. Relethford and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2012-03-27 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Introductory guide to human population genetics and microevolutionary theory Providing an introduction to mathematical population genetics, Human Population Genetics gives basic background on the mechanisms of human microevolution. This text combines mathematics, biology, and anthropology and is best suited for advanced undergraduate and graduate study. Thorough and accessible, Human Population Genetics presents concepts and methods of population genetics specific to human population study, utilizing uncomplicated mathematics like high school algebra and basic concepts of probability to explain theories central to the field. By describing changes in the frequency of genetic variants from one generation to the next, this book hones in on the mathematical basis of evolutionary theory. Human Population Genetics includes: Helpful formulae for learning ease Graphs and analogies that make basic points and relate the evolutionary process to mathematical ideas Glossary terms marked in boldface within the book the first time they appear In-text citations that act as reference points for further research Exemplary case studies Topics such as Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, inbreeding, mutation, genetic drift, natural selection, and gene flow Human Population Genetics solidifies knowledge learned in introductory biological anthropology or biology courses and makes it applicable to genetic study. NOTE: errata for the first edition can be found at the author's website: http://employees.oneonta.edu/relethjh/HPG/errata.pdf
Download or read book Tempo and Mode in Evolution written by for the National Academy of Sciences and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 1995-02-09 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since George Gaylord Simpson published Tempo and Mode in Evolution in 1944, discoveries in paleontology and genetics have abounded. This volume brings together the findings and insights of today's leading experts in the study of evolution, including Ayala, W. Ford Doolittle, and Stephen Jay Gould. The volume examines early cellular evolution, explores changes in the tempo of evolution between the Precambrian and Phanerozoic periods, and reconstructs the Cambrian evolutionary burst. Long-neglected despite Darwin's interest in it, species extinction is discussed in detail. Although the absence of data kept Simpson from exploring human evolution in his book, the current volume covers morphological and genetic changes in human populations, contradicting the popular claim that all modern humans descend from a single woman. This book discusses the role of molecular clocks, the results of evolution in 12 populations of Escherichia coli propagated for 10,000 generations, a physical map of Drosophila chromosomes, and evidence for "hitchhiking" by mutations.
