Japan JSPS Program: Models of Nucleotide Substitution and the Demographic History of Natural Populations

该奖项为加州大学伯克利分校综合生物学系、日本三岛国立遗传研究所人口遗传学系的John Wakeley博士提供为期12个月的日本科学促进会博士后奖学金。Wakeley博士将与田岛文雄博士合作进行一个名为“核苷酸替代模型和自然种群的人口历史”的研究项目。韦克利博士将在日本进行两个主要领域的研究。第一种涉及DNA序列进化模式的推断。研究人员将开发一种基于计算机的方法来量化DNA序列中位点之间核苷酸取代率的变化。该方法包括在与序列相关的谱系上随机放置假设的核苷酸替换。第二个领域涉及发展统计方法来推断人口的人口历史。Wakeley博士最近得出了来自两个交换移民的种群样本中核苷酸对序列的平均差异数的差异，并将这种差异与之前发表的两个完全隔离了一段时间的种群的结果进行了比较，发现迁移时的差异大于隔离时的差异。因此，他计划开发一种测试来区分这两种生物学上有趣的情况。＊＊＊

9408071 Wakeley This award supports a 12-month Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Postdoctoral Fellowship for Dr. John Wakeley, Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley, at the Department of Population Genetics, National Institute of Genetics, Mishima, Japan. Dr. Wakeley will work with Dr. Fumio Tajima on a research project entitled "Models of Nucleotide Substitution and the Demographic History of Natural Populations." Dr. Wakeley will pursue two main areas of research in Japan. The first involves inferences about the pattern of DNA sequence evolution. The investigators will develop a computer-based method of quantifying variation in the rate of nucleotide substitution among sites in DNA sequences. The method involves the random placement of hypothetical nucleotide substitutions on a genealogy relating the sequences. The second area involves developing statistical approaches to making inferences about the demographic history of populations. Having recently derived the variance of the average number of nucleotide differences among pairs of sequences in a sample from two populations that exchange migrants, and comparing this variance to previously published results for two populations that have been completely isolated from each other for some length of time, Dr. Wakeley found that the variance is greater under migration than under isolation. Thus, he plans to develop a test to distinguish these two biologically interesting cases. ***