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> So yes, it seems that all domestic stallions descend from just one ancestor stallion. That's amazing! I once a class on population genetics in which the inst
by danblick 9y ago
> So yes, it seems that all domestic stallions descend from just one ancestor stallion. That's amazing!
I once a class on population genetics in which the instructor commented that the "mitochondrial Eve" idea is kind of over-played. Basically, if you look at any genetic locus, you're going to find some most-recent common ancestor, but that most-recent common ancestor isn't going to be the same for all loci. (So yes, there might be a "mitochrondrial Eve", but there's also a "cytochrome Sam" and they're not necessarily the same person.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalescent_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalescent_theory
"""Because of recombination, different gene loci follow different pathways of ancestry, resulting in different gene genealogies. The coalescent is also relevant to phylogenetics, as incomplete lineage sorting between speciation events results in conflict among gene-loci in phylogenetic relationships inferred among species."""
(I'm no expert, but sometimes I think population genetics has one of the most interesting mathematical structures of all the natural processes I know about.)
- mirimir 9y agoI was about to write that Y chromosomes don't recombine. But then I checked: > The Y chromosome is only one-third the size of the X. Although the Y has a partner in X, only the tips of these chromosomes are able to recombine. http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/evolution-y-chromosome http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/evolution-y-chromosome But still, Wallner et al. (2013) only found six versions of the Y chromosome in modern horses, and argued that five of them "apparently arose on the background of HT1 by mutation or gene conversion after domestication". So yes, it looks like one ancestral stallion. But then, all commercial bananas are clones.