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Genes to Ecosystems > Mideo Lectures > Flashcards

Mideo Lectures Flashcards

1
Q

What is plasticity?

A

environmental effects that change the appearance of a phenotype without changing the genotype

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2
Q

What is the reaction norm?

A

the pattern of phenotypic expression of a single genotype across a range of environments

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3
Q

Why do bees/wasps display drunken behaviour in the fall?

A

in the fall the insects adapt to locating ripened fruit that have ethanol in their nectar

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4
Q

What is “Z=G+E”?

A

phenotype = genes + environment

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5
Q

What criteria are required for a population to undergo evolution by natural selection?

A

genetically based trait variation, variation in trait fitness

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6
Q

What is the rover/sitter polymorphism?

A

polymorphism for foraging behaviour in drosophila where rover individuals forage in more places and sitter individuals forage more in one place

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7
Q

Who discovered the rover/sitter polymorphism and when?

A

Marla Sokolowski, early 1980’s

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8
Q

What is the genetic basis for the rover/sitter polymorphism?

A

variation in cGMP dependent protein kinase, enzyme in cell signalling in the gut (ROVER = DOMINANT ALLELE)

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9
Q

What behaviour do rovers and sitters display in a low-food environment?

A

Both genotypes move less, rovers will slowly behave more like sitters

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10
Q

What behaviour do rovers and sitters display in a patchy food environment?

A

rovers eat less but explore more food patches than sitters

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11
Q

What changes occur in daphnia in a high predator environment?

A

they grow pointed helmets (think Germany WW1)

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12
Q

What changes in tadpoles occur in harsh environments?

A

they start to display cannibalism, increased size

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13
Q

What is anisogamy?

A

unequally sized gametes in males and females

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14
Q

What is parental investment theory?

A

sexes differ in how much effort/resources they invest in their offspring; the sex that invests less will compete for mating with the sex that invests more

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15
Q

What trend is shown in the Bateman curves?

A

possible number of offspring in males is limited to egg accessibility, possible number of offspring for females is limited to resource accessibility and number of eggs inseminated

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16
Q

What are examples of precopulatory competition behaviours?

A

fighting, territoriality, social status

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17
Q

What are examples of postcopulatory competition behaviours?

A

mate guarding, sperm removal/copulation duration, sperm plug, traumatic insemination, anti-aphrodisiacs

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18
Q

What competition behaviour do elephant seals display?

A

fight for better beaches and dominance on a beach, dominant males on better beaches reproduce the most

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19
Q

What competition behaviour do dragon/damselflies display?

A

females store sperm in abdomen while males guard them, males hold females until stored sperm inseminates egg, males can remove sperm from the female storage organ,

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20
Q

What competition behaviour do bluegill sunfish display?

A

larger males guard females and fertilized eggs (eggs are externally fertilized), smaller males pretend to be females and shoot sperm unexpectedly

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21
Q

What are the three strategies of the blue, yellow, and orange side blotched lizard?

A

orange: aggressive to all, defend large territories
blue: defend small territories, root out yellow males
yellow: mimic throat colour and behaviour of receptive females to deceive and out compete orange males

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22
Q

What is the difference between the results of reproductive success of males and females?

A

successful males out compete other males resulting in a higher variance of reproductive success among males, successful females do not affect the success of other females resulting in a lower variance in females

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23
Q

What happens to the variance of male reproductive success if postnatal care by females is large?

A

expected large, more females will be occupied with previous offspring and have less time to mate with new males

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24
Q

What is Fisherian Arbitrary Choice?

A

females can evolve to choose an arbitrary trait among males as desirable, resulting in a positive feedback loop and exaggerated forms of that trait

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25
What is a harem?
a group of females associated with mating with a single male that usually protects them
26
What is a lek?
a system of mating where males aggregating is thought to attract more females than one male would alone
27
What is resource defence polygamy?
a mating system where males establish a territory around resources allowing more than one female to occupy that territory at once
28
What is polyandry?
a mating system where one female mates with multiple males
29
What is the difference between social and serial monogamy?
serial monogamy allows one mate per mating season but that mate can change each new season; social monogamy is the behavioural pairing of one male and one female
30
What is the courtship display of the male bowerbird?
males create colourful bowers that the females inspect and if they like the bower they will choose that male to mate with
31
What is an example of a species that uses the lek mating system?
sage grouse
32
What were the results of the tail manipulation of widow birds experiment?
reduced tails decrease mating success, elongated tails increase mating success, sham surgeries have no effect on mating success
33
What aspect of peacock tails was preferred by female peacocks?
eyespots
34
What sort of calls do female tungara frogs prefer?
whining to attract females and complex chucks for courtship displays
35
Why do not all tungara frogs make chucks?
chucks also attract predators
36
What is the mating method of the katydid and mormon cricket?
spermatophore transferred to female during mating that contains a lot of nutrients for the female
37
What is the mating method of the hanging fly?
attracts females using pheromones, courts female with display of resource access, while female eats copulation occurs
38
What is the reproductive method of the pipefish?
females insert eggs into males brood pouch where they are fertilized and held until they are born causing role reversal and female competition
39
What is the affect of resource abundance on katydid sex roles?
when food is abundant, females do not need males for resources so males will want to create most rich territory; when resources are low, females need males for food and will compete with each other for territories allowing fro male choice
40
What is a desirable physical trait in humans?
symmetrical facial features
41
What is MHC (HLA in humans)?
Locus coding for antigen recognition for immune response, more diversity at this locus, the better for everyone
42
How do mice/humans choose mates with regards to MHC/HLA?
females can use scent to determine MHC/HLA and prefer mates with alleles of this gene that are different from their own (using birth control alters female human choice)
43
What is an alarm call behaviour?
individual guards others and makes calls if there is a predator which puts it in danger but can save the rest of the group
44
What is cooperative breeding?
behaviour where some individuals in a population do not mate but help others with mating and parenting
45
What is eusociality?
societies/populations that have multiple generations living there at the same time
46
What is game theory?
Cold war theory explaining how aggressive behaviour can be beneficial in certain situations and less beneficial in others (Hawk/Dove example)
47
What are the results of using defecting/cooperating mirrors in observing predator inspection behaviour in guppies?
When the "partner" guppie (reflection) deflects, the subject does not inspect the predator but when it cooperates the subject will inspect the predator
48
What is kin selection?
Altruistic behaviour directed at genetically similar kin
49
What is Hamilton's Rule?
bR>C; altruism occurs only when the benefit of the act times the genetic coefficient of relatedness of the individuals is greater than the cost
50
What is a eusocial society?
3 criteria: cooperative care of young, overlapping generations, division of labour often resulting in caste system
51
What is the tradeoff between parents and offspring?
giving higher resources to offspring increases their fitness but decreases number of possible future offspring for parents
52
What is the optimal provisioning rate for parents?
1/2B - 1/2C
53
What is the optimal provisioning rate for offspring
B - 1/2C
54
How do parasites modify phenotypes?
with molecular modifications; or behaviourally, morphologically
55
What modification does rabies make on its host?
increasing aggression/risk taking which could facilitate transmission
56
What modification does malaria make on mosquitos?
increased biting rate, persistence to facilitate transmission
57
What modification does malaria make on its host?
hosts infected with the transmissible malaria forms attract more mosquitoes to facilitate infection of vectors
58
What modification do parasitic worm infections make on their hosts?
parasitic worms cause cockroaches to prefer sunny areas where they are more likely to be eaten by rodents i.e. transmission
59
What modification do and fungal infections make on their hosts?
spore grows out of ant's head making it able to transmit fungus to other ants (spore release), worker ants take infected ant away from colony
60
What modification do parasitic wasps make on their hosts?
larvae grow inside infected orb weaving spiders and cause them to weave strange "cocoon webs" that are stronger and better for the pupae to grow in
61
What modification do hairworm infections make on their hosts?
juvenile hair worms infect crickets and cause them to commit suicide by jumping in the water where hairworms will grow into harmless adults
62
What are examples of parasite induced mimicry?
nematode infection in ants, trematode infection in snails
63
What are hypotheses for reasons behind parasitic modifications?
adaptations of the parasite, attempted adaptations of the host, coincidental side effect of infection
64
What is evolutionary medicine?
applying principles of natural selection to health problems
65
What is a theory for why we are vulnerable to disease?
tradeoff for balancing required immune/repair response and normal processes, environmental changes happen faster than we evolve, and pathogens are evolving faster than us
66
What is different about the virulence of the 1918 influenza?
its dramatic effects on people of all ages (unlike todays's seasonal flu)
67
What is the ebola virus?
cause of ebola hemorrhagic fever spread through contact with contaminated materials causing pains, vomiting, internal bleeding
68
How do we know that ebola is extremely virulent?
kills millions of people but only has a 3% mortality rate
69
What is virulence?
additional mortality rate that a pathogen imposes on a host
70
Which virus causes the common cold?
rhinovirus
71
What is the conventional wisdom regarding parasites?
Instances of highly virulent pathogens are cases where the host-pathogen relationship is recent because pathogens that harm hosts also harm themselves
72
How did the ebola virus spread to humans?
not harmful to bats where it is normally present, bats interact with apes that are affected by the bush meat trade; humans eat bush meat and contract ebola
73
What is H5N1?
"bird flu" coming from interaction with birds, not human-human contact
74
What is myxoma?
virus that is virulent to rabbits released in Australia to try to control the rabbit population in 1950 and still has not become non-virulent
75
What is the problem with myxoma and tuberculosis?
old pathogens that have not become less virulent and go against conventional wisdom
76
What is the parasite adaptation hypothesis?
level of virulence and transmission rate are caused by parasite replication rate in hosts
77
What is a simple model for virulence evolution?
number of new infections times the number of days infection lasts; a tradeoff between harming the host and increased transmission
78
What is Ewald's theory?
the most virulent strains increase transmission rate, but kill the host quickly, least virulent strains are quickly killed by the host, strains of intermediate virulence will increase in frequency
79
What is a constraint of pathogen transmission?
cannot be too virulent because the host needs to be able to function well enough to transmit the virus
80
What is cholera?
disease caused by the bacteria vibrio cholera resulting in severe diarrhea and dehydration and transmitted by water
81
What can we do to cause the evolution of lower virulence?
Pathogens will evolve to be highly virulent when transmission between hosts is “easy,” so we must remove vectors and limit direct transmission
82
What is the enlightened theory?
Parasites evolve to intermediate virulence based on a relationship (tradeoff) between virulence and transmission
83
What is the tragedy of the commons?
If different strains compete for the same resource the most virulent/fastest replicating strain will out compete the others
84
What are the three stages in the evolution of virulence?
accidental infection, virulence evolution soon after invasion (epidemic), evolution of optimal virulence
85
Which strain of influenza causes seasonal flu epidemics?
influenza A
86
What is NA?
neuraminidase - surface protein on influenza A that allows escape from host cell
87
What is HA?
haemagluttinin - principal antigen on surface on influenza A
88
What is NS?
interferon antagonist in influenza A- escape host’s natural | immunity
89
What are PB1, PA, and NP?
influenza A proteins for escape from cellular response
90
What is PB2?
influenza A virulence factor
91
What predictions can be made for the evolution of the seasonal flu each year?
next year’s new genetic variants should be most closely related to the strain this year that had the most new mutations
92
How are influenza vaccines created?
inactivated influenza virus (inactivated through chemical treatment or radiation) are cultured in chicken eggs
93
What is herd immunity?
vaccination of people not at high risk of influenza mortality helps to control infection rates
94
What is the origin of the 2009 H1N1 virus?
reassortment of 3 pig viruses, avian and human viruses maybe originating in Mexico
95
What are methods of malaria control?
drug treatments, eradicating vector, decreasing contact between potential host and vector
96
What is the human drug treatment for malaria?
quinine sulphate in water
97
How are mosquitos eradicated at the larval stage?
get rid of standing bodies of water where larvae develop
98
What is the pattern of frequency of resistance to insecticide sprays in mosquitos?
when spraying begins allele most frequent closest to sprayed area, as spraying continues selection for resistance increases, when spraying ceases allele frequency decreases
99
What is the problem with treating bacterial diseases like tuberculosis with antibiotics?
antibiotics are a strong selective force that select for antibiotic resistant bacteria
100
How is HIV transmitted?
sexual, perinatal, blood, breast milk
101
What makes HIV a retrovirus?
possession of reverse transcriptase enzyme that converts RNA into DNA to insert viral DNA into the host cell genome
102
What is the life cycle of HIV?
HIV virion attaches to lymphocyte, inserts viral DNA into host genome, host cellular machinery replicates viral DNA eventually killing lymphocyte, compromising host immune system > AIDS > death
103
What is AZT?
drug treatment for HIV that mimics thymidine using azidothymidine, disabling the activity of reverse transcriptase
104
What is the problem with AZT use to treat HIV?
only one mutation is required for reverse transcriptase to become resistant to AZT and once this happens even massive doses of the drug are ineffective at stopping almost any viral activity
105
How does HIV evolve so fast?
high mutation rate, short generation time, massive population size
106
What is HAART?
highly active antiretroviral therapy - cocktail of different drugs taken at once so that HIV cannot become resistant to it in just one mutation
107
What is the origin of HIV?
SIV (primate version) less virulent in primates, jumped to human population where it is highly virulent probably through the bush meat trade
108
What is a vaccine?
biological treatments meant to improve immune responses to future exposures to diseases
109
What are the types of vaccines?
live attenuated, killed, toxoids
110
What are 3 risky assumptions that encourage the unregulated use of vaccines?
no evolutionary consequences because vaccine immunity just replaces natural immunity, because vaccination has been helpful for 100+ years any problems would be apparent by now, evolved vaccine resistant pathogens will probably do less damage than the current ones
111
What is the problem with the hepatitis b virus and vaccines?
current vaccine targeting 'a' surface antigen is effective but one base pair change results in a resistant mutant and the mutant is increasing in frequency in vaccinated people
112
What is the problem with malaria and vaccines?
no current vaccine for malaria because it has many subsets of surface antigens that readily change when introduced to a vaccinated environment
113
What has been the result of vaccination for diphtheria?
toxoid vaccines highly successful in reducing childhood mortality from diphtheria because they reduced the toxin producing strains
114
Why do vaccines have the most success with acute childhood infections?
these diseases act quickly and the host either survives or dies, and survival offers lifelong immunity, so inducing this immunity seems to stop these diseases
115
Why are the targets from today's vaccine research different from in the past?
pathogen populations are more polymorphic, some strains can infect host with immunity to other strains, infections often chronic due to immunosuppression and antigenic variation/evolution
116
What is the cause of myopia?
elongated eyeball, hereditary
117
What gene x environment interaction produces myopia?
some genes cause eyeball elongation in response to reading/spending most time under artificial light during development
118
What are the hypotheses for why we get fevers?
manipulation of host by pathogen to increase reproductive rate or adaptive defence by host to reduce pathogen reproductive rate
119
How have the fever hypotheses been proved/disproved?
Iguanas injected with disease basked in heat to induce a fever, those that did this lived longer; humans given anti-fever drugs for a cold reported more severe symptoms
120
What are the hypothetical reasons for menopause?
menopause is an artifact of an extended lifespan that is common now because of reduced mortality rates; females stop reproducing so they may better care for their offspring

Genes to Ecosystems (3 decks)

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