Monthly Archives: April 2014

What we're reading: Tradeoffs in a songbird pathogen, new coalescent models, and the value of museum collections

In the journals Williams PD, AP Dobson, KV Dhondt, DM Hawley, and AA Dhondt. 2014. Evidence of trade-offs shaping virulence evolution in an emerging wildlife pathogen. Journal of Evolutionary Biology. doi: 10.1111/jeb.12379. Relationships between pathogen traits are also investigated, with … Continue reading

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Scanning the genome for local adaptation

One of the most obvious and important applications of evolutionary genetics is in figuring out whether natural biological communities are going to be able to adapt to global climate change. The projected rate of climate change over then next century … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, association genetics, genomics, next generation sequencing | Tagged , , | 9 Comments

What we're reading: Stick insects, Gulf of Mexico oysters, and how many peer reviewers it takes to change a lightbulb joke?

In the journals Comeault, A. a., V. Soria-Carrasco, Z. Gompert, T. E. Farkas, C. A. Buerkle, T. L. Parchman, and P. Nosil. 2014. Genome-wide association mapping of phenotypic traits subject to a range of intensities of natural selection in Timema … Continue reading

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Identifying and quantifying fitness effects across loci

The following guest post by Ethan Jewett is cross-posted from the is cross-posted from the CEHG blog at Stanford. Enjoy! The degree to which similarities and differences among species are the result of natural selection, rather than genetic drift, is … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, genomics, population genetics, theory | 1 Comment

What we're reading: Polygenic mutation-selection balance, demographics of invading mice, and the U.S. consensus on climate change

In the journals de Vladar HP, N Barton. 2014. Stability and response of polygenic traits to stabilizing selection and mutation. Genetics. doi: 10.1534/genetics.113.159111. The interplay between stabilizing selection and mutation leads to a sharp transition: alleles with effects smaller than … Continue reading

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Why we sign our peer reviews

Last week I posted the results from a brief survey of our readers, asking whether they usually sign their peer reviews. In that small sample of evolutionary ecologists, the overwhelming majority said they review anonymously, though many participants seem to … Continue reading

Posted in career, community, peer review, science publishing | 6 Comments

Why we don't sign our peer reviews

Last week I posted the results from a brief survey of our readers, asking whether they usually sign their peer reviews. In that small sample of evolutionary ecologists, the overwhelming majority said they review anonymously, though many participants seem to … Continue reading

Posted in career, community, peer review, science publishing | 4 Comments

What we're reading: Coevolving diversity, gut microbiota and gas, and killing the phrase "next-generation sequencing"

In the journals Boots M., A. White, A. Best, and R. Bowers. 2014. How specificity and epidemiology drive the coevolution of static trait diversity in hosts and parasites. Evolution. doi: 10.1111/evo.12393 We examine theoretically how epidemiological feedbacks and the characteristics … Continue reading

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Do we sign our peer reviews? Mostly, no.

Update, 24 November 2014: There’s been a renewed interest in this post, so now is as good a time as any to note that, in addition to this survey, I also posted written responses from folks who choose to sign … Continue reading

Posted in community, peer review, science publishing | 11 Comments

Journals must boost data sharing

Here’s the text from Tim’s recent (3rd April) Correspondence piece in Nature The journal ecosystem is a powerful filter of scientific literature, promoting the best work into the best journals. Why not use a similar mechanism to encourage more comprehensive … Continue reading

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