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Date: | Fri, 14 Aug 2020 18:43:25 -0400 |
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What is missing in social insect research? I think that what
is increasingly missing is people doing fieldwork on
behavior and natural history.
The future of evolutionary biology looks promising for
that kind of combined research. For a time, the field was
preoccupied with transmission genetics and progress in
molecular biology focused on DNA. Now genetic
research is moving toward the phenotype, symptomized
by terms like ‘proteomics’ and ‘epigenetics’ and other
indicators of emphasis on gene expression and environmental
influence rather than transmission genetics alone.
A focus on gene expression means thinking about the
genes that actually underlie particular evolved traits. As a
result, it becomes increasingly relevant to know what
those genes actually do, with respect to behavior, physiology
and morphology. And that boils down to a return to
the field, where the traits actually influence selection.
Mary Jane West-Eberhard
Current Opinion in Insect Science 2019, 34:ix–xx
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