Selection for tameness has changed brain gene expression in silver foxes

Selection for tameness has changed brain gene expression in silver foxes

A long-term selection experiment for tameness in silver foxes offers a unique model to study transcriptome evolution associated with early canid domestication without confounding environmental effects. Our results suggest that dramatic behavioural and physiological changes caused by selection for tameness may be associated with only limited changes in brain transcriptome. The first step in dome...

Genetic influences on brain gene expression in rats selected for tameness and aggression.

Interindividual differences in many behaviors are partly due to genetic differences, but the identification of the genes and variants that influence behavior remains challenging. Here, we studied an F2 intercross of two outbred lines of rats selected for tame and aggressive behavior toward humans for >64 generations. By using a mapping approach that is able to identify genetic loci segregating ...

Chicken domestication: Effects of tameness on brain gene expression and DNA methylation

Domestication greatly increases phenotypic variation in a short time span, with selection for a single phenotype and a plethora of associated phenotypic changes as an outcome of the process. The domestication process influences the underlying genomic architecture of a species, and the success and speed of the process is likely influenced by it. The main aims of my thesis was to study how domest...

Kind granddaughters of angry grandmothers: the effect of domestication on vocalization in cross-bred silver foxes.

The genetic basis of the effects of domestication has previously been examined in relation to morphological, physiological and behavioural traits, but not for vocalizations. According to Belyaev [Belyaev, D.K., 1979. Destabilizing selection as a factor in domestication. J. Hered. 70, 301-308], directional selection for tame behaviour toward humans resulted in domestication. This hypothesis has ...

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