动物的驯化是新石器时代农业革命的主要内容之一,导致了人类生活方式从狩猎向畜牧的转变。开展家养动物起源与驯化的研究,不仅有助于了解人类社会的发展史和人工选择下动物的进化过程,而且有助于开展家养动物的良种选育和遗传多样性保护,因此该研究领域受到了人们的长期关注。近年来,随着更多考古证据的发现与分子遗传学的发展,人们对于家养动物的起源与驯化有了更深入的认识。本文对家养动物起源与驯化研究中一些基本问题的研究方法和进展进行了综述。文章第一部分介绍了家养动物的野生祖先、起源地、起源时间、建群者大小和扩散路线等问题;第二部分则涉及家养动物驯化的条件、过程、性状改变及其遗传机制等方面。最后指出了家养动物起源与驯化研究中依然存在的问题,并对未来研究发展的趋势进行了讨论。
Animal domestication was one of the major contributory factors of the agricultural revolution during the Neolithic period, which resulted in a shift of paradigm in the contemporary lifestyle of human from hunting to farming. Research on the origin and domestication of animals is helpful not merely to understand the historical as well as societal transformation of human and the process of animal evolution under the influence of artificial selection but also to formulate the strategies for improving breeding varieties and con- servation of domestic animals genetic diversity. Thus researches in this domain have received attention for a long time. In recent years, more archeological evidences coupled with recent developments in the molecular genetics approaches have led to a better understanding of the origin and the underlying process of domestication of animals. In this review, we attempt to state the recent progresses in the research methodologies and breakthroughs in molecular understanding of the basic issues related to the origin and subsequent domestication of animals. The first part of the paper deals with the wild ancestors of domestic animals, the sites of origin and time, the founders and the expansion routes. The second part refers to the conditions that had influ- enced the domestication process, the traits variation and the underlying genetic mechanisms. Finally, several shortcomings of the previous studies have been highlighted and the challenges and strategies for future direction of research have also been discussed.