John Thoday
John Marion Thoday
Thoday was born in
His research from 1947 has been largely concerned with the causes and functions of intraspecific genetic variation, on the nature of continuous genetic variation and on the effects of selection on such variation. He has published an important thesis on the meaning of biological progress in evolution and the role of genetic variation in determining long term fitness. He has pioneered a method for the location on chromosomes of genes mediating continuous variation, and showed (contrary to accepted theory) that the genes at different loci affected the quantitative character in qualitatively different ways. He has pioneered experiments into disruptive selection (selection in the same population for both extremes and against intermediates), and (again contrary to theoretical expectation), showed such selection could be extremely effective, increasing variance, establishing and maintaining polymorphisms, and, if the selected individuals were allowed to choose their mates, dividing the population into two partially isolated parts, something which is a step towards speciation.
References
- S2CID 235676185.
- ^ Bootham School Register. York, England: Bootham Old Scholars Association. 2011.
- ^ Oxford Dictionary of National Biography[permanent dead link]
External links
- Obituary in The Telegraph
- Obituary in The Times
- http://www.emma.cam.ac.uk/teaching/fellows/display/index.cfm?fellow=67
- http://www.professorjohnthoday.com/publications.html Professor Thoday's full publications listing.
- http://www.professorjohnthoday.com/ Professor Thoday's personal web site.