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Signatures of selection with cultural interference
Laurel Fogarty1, Sarah P Otto2
1Department of Human Behavior, Ecology and Culture, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany.
Summary
Human culture and genes interact, influencing evolution. Gene-culture coevolution can mimic genetic selection signatures and alter natural selection efficacy in the human genome.
Area of Science:
- Evolutionary biology
- Human evolution
- Cultural evolution
- Genetics
Background:
- Human evolution is deeply intertwined with culture, affecting health, reproduction, and environment.
- Understanding gene-culture interactions and their impact on the human genome is limited.
- Existing methods to detect gene-culture interactions are insufficient.
Purpose of the Study:
- To describe rules of cultural transmission that promote stable gene-culture associations.
- To investigate gene-culture hitchhiking and its genomic signatures.
- To model selective interference between cultural and genetic traits.
Main Methods:
- Described rules of cultural transmission for gene-culture associations.
- Modeled genetic hitchhiking in gene-culture systems.
- Simulated selective interference between cultural and genetic traits.
Main Results:
- Stable associations between cultural and genetic traits can lead to gene-culture hitchhiking, leaving genomic signatures.
- Selective interference between cultural and genetic traits can reduce natural selection efficacy.
- Strong cultural transmission biases can increase selection efficiency at genetic loci.
Conclusions:
- Gene-culture interactions leave complex and diverse signatures in genetic data.
- The interplay between culture and genes significantly impacts human evolutionary trajectories.
- Further research is needed to fully understand the dynamics of gene-culture coevolution.
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