On Wednesday November 1st, Prof. Thomas F. Hansen will give a talk at UMB entitled: Epistatic gene interaction and the evolution of genetic architecture.
 Thomas F. Hansen |
Place: UMB, Animal Science Building, "Fortek" seminar room, lower ground floor
Evolvability, the ability to respond to a selection pressure, is a fundamentally important, but often neglected, concept in evolutionary biology. The variability, and therefore the evolvability, of a character is determined by its genetic architecture, i.e. the structure of the genotype-phenotype map. Analytical work and computer simulations show that different patterns of epistatic gene interaction can have profound effects on evolvability. This is not the least because the genetic architecture itself evolves during a response to selection. A method for the study of evolution of genetic architecture will be presented, and used to understand the dynamics of evolvability.
Thomas F. Hansen is a theoretical evolutionary biologist at the University of Oslo's Dept. of Biology who uses mathematical modelling as his chief research tool. He is also a core member of the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis (CEES), which focuses on how environmental, ecological and evolutionary processes are interrelated.
For more information on Prof. Hansen and his work, please see this link.
