My little zebra: The secrets of domestication

[n2doc]

05 October 2009 by Henry Nicholls
IN 2003, while geneticist Svante Pääbo was visiting Novosibirsk, Russia's third-largest city, he decided to look in on a famous experiment run by the Institute of Cytology and Genetics, which is based in the city. Fifty years ago, the then head of the IC&G, geneticist Dmitry Belyaev, had begun breeding silver foxes to see how easily they could be tamed. What Pääbo didn't know, though, is that Belyaev had also set up another experiment in the 1970s involving rats. This time, one line of rats was selected for tameness and another selected for aggression.

When Pääbo saw them, he was stunned. After just 30 years of selection, the IC&G researchers had fashioned two populations that could hardly be more different. "I could take the tame ones out of the cage with my bare hands. They would creep under my shirt and seemed to actually seek and enjoy contact," recalls Pääbo. "The aggressive animals were so aggressive I got the feeling that 10 or 20 of them would probably kill me if they got out of the cages."

Here was a great opportunity to uncover the genetic changes responsible for the behavioural differences, Pääbo realised. Back at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, Pääbo and his team have been trying to do just this. If they succeed, their findings could have far-reaching consequences.

The zebra, for instance, is a stubborn beast, one that has thwarted all efforts to domesticate it, as have the cheetah, the African buffalo and the rhinoceros. Understanding the genetic basis of tameness might make it possible to domesticate the undomesticatable and turn exotic species into farm animals or even pets. It could also help us understand what makes some people overly aggressive - and perhaps even lead to treatments for behavioural disorders.

more:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427281.500-my-little-zebra-the-secrets-of-domestication.html

[Buzz Clik]

1. Cue Michael Jackson's theme song to the movie, "Ben".

gad.

[appal_jack]

2. or Jane's Addiction: "We Make Great Pets." k&r. n/t

[juno jones]

3. Silver foxes can be amazingly unafraid of humans

I saw my only pair on San Juan Island here in Puget sound. A friend and I were at the local sculpture garden when these two frolicking foxes ran by, one black with silver points, the other chocolate with silver points. They played around us, never getting too close-or too far, they stayed visible around us for perhaps 20 minutes or so before scrambling under a fence and running off. Beautiful and amazing creatures. I don't doubt a tame silver fox would be cool, yet, taming animals for pets has it's drawbacks, look at all the problems associated with exotic pet abuse. I hope they stay just as they are.

[jgraz]

5. Dawkins has a great discussion of the silver fox experiment in his new book

Belyaev not only produced tame foxes, he produced the side effects of floppy ears and upward-pointed tails (among other doggy characteristics). Apparently, the genes for the "domestic look" come along for the ride when you breed for tameness.

[juno jones]

6. Interesting.

I wonder if those traits also translate as some kind of social signals for docility (especially in canids). I will be reading more on it, thanks!

[dem mba]

4. i am 100% confident

that within a generation or two super wealthy people will have genetically modified exotic pets; zebras, koalas, etc. or they'll have pets that are genetically-altered to prevent them from "aging". for example, a polar bear cub that never fully grows into a giant furry killing machine. perma-puppies if you will.

sounds pretty sci-fi but we're not too far off this type of technology now. imagine where we'll be in 50 years. ethics will take a back seat to large sums of money and the ultimate status-symbols - bio-engineered, cute as all-hell pets.

what do you think? am i crazy?

[Posteritatis]

8. Cavalier King Charles spaniels; we're already there

Folks are already dropping obscene amounts of money on hyper-mutated wolves whose skulls are becoming smaller than their brains.

[dem mba]

10. dog breeding is indeed a lucrative industry already

imagine when scientists can flip genes on and off like a light switch.

[Posteritatis]

7. New Scientist is a gold mine today; lots of interesting stuff. (nt)

[eppur_se_muova]

9. Zebra, cheetah, rhino, Cape Buffalo ... all African animals.

(And African elephant not domesticable, unlike Asian elephant.) Possibly their adaptation to prehistoric humans hunting them ... humans traveled out of Africa to find "naive" animals that had not adapted to human presence, and domesticated them.

Resonates with Jared Diamond's analysis in Guns, Germs, and Steel -- Africans never had domesticated animals to do their work for them, while Eurasians did. And NAs in NA couldn't domesticate buffalo. In SA camelids could be domesticated, leading to more intensively agricultural, and later, urban societies ... interesting.

Mithen's After the Ice also has some interesting discussion of the origin of domestication, including fairly recent evidence.
http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/whc/4.1/br_hughes-warrington.html