SubjectsSubjects(version: 965)
Course, academic year 2024/2025
  
Molecular Basis of Evolution - AM320086
Title: Molecular Basis of Evolution
Guaranteed by: Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology (320)
Faculty: Faculty of Food and Biochemical Technology
Actual: from 2024
Semester: winter
Points: winter s.:3
E-Credits: winter s.:3
Examination process: winter s.:
Hours per week, examination: winter s.:2/0, Ex [HT]
Capacity: unknown / unknown (unknown)
Min. number of students: unlimited
State of the course: taught
Language: Czech
Teaching methods: full-time
Level:  
Note: course can be enrolled in outside the study plan
enabled for web enrollment
Guarantor: Vopálenský Pavel Ing. Ph.D.
Annotation -
The course will provide an overview of evolutionary biology with emphasis on biochemical and molecular genetic principles. The course is divided into three modules focusing on (i) biochemical evolution, (ii) biological evolution, and (iii) interconnection between cell biology, developmental genetics and evolutionary process including the methodological approaches.
Last update: Lipovová Petra (13.07.2023)
Literature -

Z: Dan Graur: Molecular and Genome Evolution, Oxford University Press, 2016, ISBN: 9781605354699

Z: John Maynard Smith: Evolutionary Genetics, Oxford University Press 1998, ISBN: ‎ 0198502311

D: Zubay Geoffrey: Origins of Life - On Earth and in the Cosmos, Academic Press; 2nd edition (January 18, 2000), ISBN: ‎ 9780127819105

D: Richard Dawkins: Slepý hodinář, Paseka, 2002, ISBN: 80-7185-445-X

D: Richard Dawkins: The blind watchmaker, e.g. Penguin Books, 2006, ISBN-10: ‎ 0141982454

D: Jaroslav Flegr: 2007: Úvod do evoluční biologie. Academia, Praha. ISBN: 80-200-1539-6

Last update: Lipovová Petra (12.10.2023)
Syllabus -

1) Introduction to evolutionary thinking (Darwin, Lamarck, Hamilton, Dawkins etc) + Origin of Life 1: From the Big Bang to suitable conditions on the Earth, important aspects of chemical elements, geology and atmosphere for the origin of life

2) Origin of Life 2: From suitable geological conditions to the nucleic acids, RNA world, genetic code, white-black smokers, clay hypothesis, astrobiology

3) Origin of Life 3: Origin of transcription/translation, origin of eukaryotic cells and its organelles, evolution of metabolism and its consequences for geology/atmosphere

4) Biological evolution – fundamentals: general properties of life, complexity, evolvability, biological species, fitness, variation and selection, convergent and parallel evolution, cladograms

5) Natural selection – k- and r- strategy, individual and group selection, frequency-dependent selection, sexual selection – advantages and disadvantages, consequences

6) Mutation – positive, neutral, negative, origin of mutations, mutational frequency, molecular clock

7) Population genetics and evolution - genetic drift and draft, gene flow, molecular drive, meiotic drive, reparation drive, mutational bias

8) Speciation and extinction: allopatric and sympatric, punctuated equilibrium, sexual vs asexual speciation, reasons for extinction, geological epochs

9) Evolution of genes and genomes, and how to study them: gene and genome organization, duplication and rearrangements, polyploidy, bioinformatics approaches to phylogeny

10) Microbial evolution: features of bacterial and archaeal evolutionary genetics, viruses, viroids, horizontal transfer, microbial consortia

11) Evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo): model organisms and their selection, phylotypic stages, hour-glass model, gene regulatory networks, example – evolution of the placenta.

12) Cell type evolution: conservation of regulatory and signalling cascades, developmental and terminal selector genes, example – the evolution of neuronal cells and the eye

13) Pseudo-evolutionary principles during development: selection during immune and neural system development, cancer evolution

14) Application of evolutionary mechanisms: in vitro evolution, aptamers, phage display, directed evolution of proteins, use of synthetic gene drives in biotechnology.

Last update: Lipovová Petra (13.07.2023)
 
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