Dmitri Belyaev

Dmitri Belyaev

Dmitri Konstantinovich Belyaev ( _ru. Дмитрий Константинович Беляев, 1917-1985) - a Russian scientist, academician. In the 1950s Dmitri Belyaev and his team spent many years breeding the silver fox (Vulpes vulpes) and selecting only those individuals that showed the least fear of humans. Eventually, Belyaev's team selected only those that showed the most positive response to humans. He ended up with a population of foxes whose behavior and appearance was significantly changed. After about ten generations of controlled breeding, these foxes no longer showed any fear of humans and often wagged their tails and licked their human caretakers to show affection. They also started to have spotted coats, floppy ears, and curled tails.

At the time, biologists were puzzled as to how dogs evolved to have different coats than wolves. They couldn't figure how dogs got those genes from wolves. Belyaev saw his foxes as a perfect opportunity to find out how this happened. He and his colleagues began performing tests on the animals. When they checked the adrenaline levels of the domesticated foxes, they found that they were significantly lower than normal. This is feasible, because foxes that are not afraid of humans are going to produce less adrenaline around them. This explains the foxes' tameness, but it doesn't really explain their multicolor coats. The scientists theorized that adrenaline shares a biochemical pathway with melanin, which controls pigment production.

Quote from NOVA's 'Dogs and More Dogs' program

NARRATOR: Suddenly, it all started to make sense. As Belyaev bred his foxes for tameness, over the generations their bodies began producing different levels of a whole range of hormones. These hormones, in turn, set off a cascade of changes that somehow triggered a surprising degree of genetic variation.
JAMES SERPELL: Just the simple act of selecting for tameness destabilized the genetic make up of these animals in such a way that all sorts of stuff that you would never normally see in a wild population suddenly appeared.

Dmitri Belyaev was director of the Institute of Cytology and Genetics (IC&G) of the Russian Academy of Sciences from 1959-1985. He made significant contributions to the establishment of the IC&G and made efforts in the restoration and advancement of genetics in the USSR.

ee also

*Domestication
*Tame Silver Fox

External links

* [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/25/health/25rats.html?ex=1311480000&en=ee8f5fbaf0576814&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss Nice Rats, Nasty Rats: Maybe It’s All in the Genes]


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Нужен реферат?

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Dmitri Belyaev — Dmitri Konstantinowitsch Beljajew (russisch Дмитрий Константинович Беляев; * 17. Juli 1917 in Protassowo, Kostroma; † 14. November 1985) war ein russischer Genetiker. Inhaltsverzeichnis 1 Leben 2 Wissenschaftliche Arbeit …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Dmitri Beljajew — Dmitri Konstantinowitsch Beljajew (russisch Дмитрий Константинович Беляев; * 17. Juli 1917 in Protassowo, Kostroma; † 14. November 1985) war ein russischer Genetiker. Inhaltsverzeichnis 1 Leben 2 Wissenschaftliche Arbeit …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Dmitri Konstantinowitsch Beljajew — (russisch Дмитрий Константинович Беляев; * 17. Juli 1917 in Protassowo, Kostroma; † 14. November 1985) war ein russischer Genetiker. Inhaltsverzeichnis 1 Leben 2 Wissenschaftliche Arbeit …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Dmitri Beliaïev — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Beliaïev. Dmitri Konstantinovitch Beliaïev Naissance 1917 (URSS) Décès 1985 (URSS) Nationalité Soviétique Champs …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Domesticated silver fox — A Russian Silver Fox, the kind used by scientist Dmitry Belyaev for genetics research in Novosibirsk. The domesticated silver fox (marketed as the Siberian fox) is a domesticated form of the silver morph of the red fox. As a result of selective… …   Wikipedia

  • Tame Silver Fox — Taxobox name = Tame Silver Fox status = DOM |Two Russian tame foxes from the project. This group has only about one hundred specimens. image width = 230px regnum = Animalia phylum = Chordata classis = Mammalia ordo = Carnivora familia = Canidae… …   Wikipedia

  • Belyayev — (masculine) or Belyayeva (feminine) is a popular Russian surname which may refer to:;People *Aleksandr Belyaev, Russian author of science fiction *Alexander Belyayev (decembrist), a member of the Decembrist movement *Anatoly Belyayev, a Soviet… …   Wikipedia

  • Nikolai Dubinin — Nikolai Petrovich Dubinin (January 4 1907 ndash; March 26 1998) was a Russian biologist and academician.He was a Corresponding Member of the Division of Biological Sciences from 1946 and Academician of the Division of the General Biology from… …   Wikipedia

  • Domestizierung — oder Domestikation ist ein innerartlicher Veränderungsprozess von Wildtieren oder pflanzen, bei dem diese durch den Menschen über Generationen hinweg von der Wildform genetisch isoliert gehalten werden. Damit wird ein Zusammenleben mit dem… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Dog anatomy — includes the same internal structures that are in humans. Details of structures vary tremendously from breed to breed, more than in any other animal species, wild or domesticated,[1] as dogs vary from the tiny Chihuahua to the giant Irish… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”