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Genetic load and biological changes to extant humans

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 August 2020

Arthur Saniotis Open the ORCID record for Arthur Saniotis [Opens in a new window] ,
Maciej Henneberg Open the ORCID record for Maciej Henneberg [Opens in a new window]  and
Kazhaleh Mohammadi
Arthur Saniotis*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, Ludwik Hirszfeld Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy, Polish Academy of Sciences, Wroclaw, Poland Biological Anthropology and Comparative Anatomy Research Unit, Adelaide Medical School, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA, Australia
Maciej Henneberg
Affiliation:
Biological Anthropology and Comparative Anatomy Research Unit, Adelaide Medical School, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA, Australia Institute of Evolutionary Medicine, University of Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
Kazhaleh Mohammadi
Affiliation:
Department of Medical Laboratory Science. Knowledge University, Erbil, Kurdistan Region, Iraq
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

Extant humans are currently increasing their genetic load, which is informing present and future human microevolution. This has been a gradual process that has been rising over the last centuries as a consequence of improved sanitation, nutritional improvements, advancements in microbiology and medical interventions, which have relaxed natural selection. Moreover, a reduction in infant and child mortality and changing societal attitudes towards fertility have led to a decrease in total fertility rates (TFRs) since the 19th century. Generally speaking, decreases in differential fertility and mortality have meant that there is less opportunity for natural selection to eliminate deleterious mutations from the human gene pool. It has been argued that the average human may carry ~250–300 mutations that are mostly deleterious, as well as several hundred less-deleterious variants. These deleterious alleles in extant humans mean that our fitness is being constrained. While such alleles are viewed as reducing human fitness, they may also have had an adaptive function in the past, such as assisting in genetic complexity, sexual recombination and diploidy. Saying this, our current knowledge on these fitness compromising alleles is still lacking.

Keywords

EvolutionGenetic mutationsRelaxed selection
Type
Short Report
Information
Journal of Biosocial Science , Volume 53 , Issue 4 , July 2021 , pp. 639 - 642
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

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