DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Evolutionary Consequences of Direct and Indirect Contributions to Additive Genetic Variation in Wild Baboons.

进化生物学的一个主要目标是了解基因和环境是如何结合在一起创造我们在自然界中看到的动物之间的变异的。社会行为的变化尤其重要，因为我们知道动物的社会行为对它如何有效地应对环境有重大影响。然而，社会生活模糊了基因和环境之间的区别，因为社会环境(至少部分)是由其成员的基因决定的。因此，影响动物社会行为的基因包括它自己的基因(直接遗传效应，DGE)，也可能包括它的父母、兄弟姐妹和社会伴侣的基因(间接遗传效应，IGES)。理论表明，IGES可以深刻地影响社会行为的演变。然而，在实验室之外，很少有研究研究IGES如何导致社会行为的变异，或者IGES是否影响自然动物种群的生活史特征和社会行为。这项建议调查了在高度社会化的非人类灵长类自然种群中，直接和间接遗传效应在生活史和社会行为进化中的作用，从而将提供数据来检验上述理论结果。这将是为数不多的直接和间接遗传效应对野生动物表型变异的研究之一，并有可能极大地提高对生活史和社会行为进化的理解。PI将使用数量遗传学方法中的混合效应线性模型(特别是“动物模型”)来衡量肯尼亚安博塞利国家公园研究充分的野生狒狒的生活史和社会行为所产生的直接和间接遗传变异。我们还将测量直接和间接遗传效应之间的协方差，以了解这种遗传结构对这些性状的表型进化的影响。这些调查结果将通过会议报告和教育宣传向科学界和普通公众传播。此外，这项工作将为来自代表性不足的少数民族的学生和研究人员提供重要的培训，并促进美国、肯尼亚和英国机构之间的全球合作。

A major goal of evolutionary biology is to understand how genes and environments combine to create the variation we see among animals in nature. Variation in social behavior, in particular, is important to understand, because we know that an animal's social behavior has a major impact on how effectively it copes with its environment. However, social living blurs the distinction between genes and environments because the social environment is (at least partly) determined by the genes of its members. Accordingly, the genes that influence an animal's social behavior include its own genes (direct genetic effects, DGEs) and potentially also the genes of its parents, siblings and social partners (indirect genetic effects, IGEs). Theory has shown that IGEs can profoundly affect how social behavior evolves. However, remarkably few studies have investigated how IGEs contribute to variation in social behavior or whether IGEs affect life history traits and social behavior in natural animal populations, outside of the laboratory. This proposal investigates the role of direct and indirect genetic effects in the evolution of life history and social behavior in a natural population of highly social non-human primates and will thus provide data that can test the theoretical result described above. This will be one of only a handful of studies of both direct and indirect genetic effects on phenotypic variation in the wild, and has the potential to greatly enhance understanding of the evolution of life history and social behavior. The PIs will use mixed effects linear models (in particular, the 'animal model') in a quantitative genetics approach to measure the direct and indirect genetic variation contributing to life history and social behaviors in the well-studied wild baboons of Amboseli National Park, Kenya. We will also measure the covariance between direct and indirect genetic effects to understand the consequences of this genetic architecture on the phenotypic evolution of these traits. These findings will be communicated to the scientific community and general public through conference presentations and educational outreach. Additionally, this work will provide important training for students and researchers from underrepresented minorities and foster global collaborations between USA, Kenyan and UK institutions.