Domestication: it's only natural

Domesticated plant and animal genomes provide excellent material for the study of haplotypes and adaptation, according to Gane Ka-Shu Wong, deputy director of the Beijing Institute of Genomics.

"Nothing we eat is like the wild form," he told the XIX International Congress of Genetics, noting that humans had been domesticating plants and animals for around 10,000 years.

Using the rice genome, encompassing both the indica and japonica strains, as a model, Gane said adaptive gene blocks were correlated to SNP "deserts", or areas with lower than expected SNP frequencies, which made up about 15 per cent of the rice genome.

"We've consistently selected adaptive gene blocks over many years of domestication," he said.

But in addition to domesticating the genomes of the major food organisms, Gane said that humans had also succeeded in domesticating their own genomes, selecting for adaptations such as the 'thrifty' genes thought to be responsible for today's obesity problems.

And urbanised animals were also subject to the pressures of domestication, he said.