Animals
Explainer: What is animal domestication?
The difference between a dog and a wolf isn’t looks or genes or even behavior. It’s the relationship these animals have with people.
MS-LS4-5
Gather and synthesize information about the technologies that have changed the way humans influence the inheritance of desired traits in organisms.
More Stories in MS-LS4-5
- Health & Medicine
Let’s learn about allergies
Allergies are caused by the body’s immune system overreacting to harmless substances.
- Health & Medicine
Should we use a genetic weapon against mosquitoes carrying malaria?
One gene drive to eliminate malaria seems to work in the lab. Now it’s time to ask local people if they want it released in the wild.
- Animals
A dog’s breed doesn’t say much about its behavior
Many people associate dog breeds with specific behavioral traits. But breed appears to account for only about 9 percent of behavioral differences.
- Archaeology
Our species may have reached Europe while Neandertals were there
Archaeological finds from an ancient French rock-shelter show periodic settlements by both populations, just not at the same time.
- Animals
Mysterious kunga is the oldest known human-bred hybrid animal
People bred these animals — part donkey, part wild ass — some 4,500 years ago, probably for use in fighting wars.
- Animals
Cloning boosts endangered black-footed ferrets
A cloned ferret named Elizabeth Ann brings genetic diversity to a species that nearly went extinct in the 1980s.
- Life
Even raised by people, wolves don’t tune into you like your dog
Dog puppies outpace wolf pups at engaging with humans, even with less exposure to people, supporting the idea that domestication changed dogs’ brains.
- Health & Medicine
Bringing COVID-19 vaccines to much of world is hard
The price of not vaccinating nearly everyone across the world could be a longer pandemic and more troubling variants of the new coronavirus.
- Humans
By not including everyone, genome science has blind spots
Little diversity in genetic databases makes precision medicine hard for many. One historian proposes a solution, but some scientists doubt it’ll work.
