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1. I have read this elegantly-designed research report.
2. I am not a specialist in genetics or genomics.
3. Gene Robinson edited this paper for PNAS, insuring its visibility by specialists and non-specialists.
4. This paper from Yoav Gilad's lab is not only a landmark in mammalian sociogenomics (MSG), but, also, raises numerous questions that highlight how far the MSG field has to go.
5. I consider it important that non-specialist readers understand the differences between what is happening in this paper compared to/contrasted to the sociogenomics research ongoing in Robinson's, and similar, labs studying non-mammalian taxa.
6. I consider two statements on page 5 (Early Edition) of the paper in question to be particularly unfortunate:
a. "...our results demonstrate that these associations, also, appear to be highly plastic." For several reasons, no (mainstream) scientific consensus exists about how to define "plastic", an increasingly obfuscating term. Related, the authors make no reference to the type of regulation that might be responsible for the observed "associations" among "neural, endocrine, and immune function". I consider this omission important because regulation of the observed "associations" might be some standardized mammalian or vertebrate mechanism capable of combinatorial effects (in this case, re-combinations of "neural, endocrine, and immune" responses).
b. "These observations indicate that any causal [sic] relationship between dominance rank and gene regulation likely begins with rank, rather than vice versa." The report provides no evidence to support such a claim that, like comment "a" above, runs a risk of reinforcing slippery and unclear formulations about the nature, role, generation, directionality (ies), primacy, etc. of "responsive" phenotypes.
7. Notwithstanding, future work on MSG from Gilad's and other labs is eagerly anticipated.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/cbjones1943
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