Professor Arthur James Cain FRS (25 July 1921 – 20 August 1999) was a British evolutionary biologist and ecologist. Events 285 - Diocletian appoints Maximian as Caesar, co-ruler Year 1921 ( MCMXXI) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link will display full 1921 calendar of the Gregorian calendar Events 636 - Battle of Yarmouk: Arab forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid take control of Syria and Palestine Year 1999 ( MCMXCIX) was a Common year starting on Friday (link will display full 1999 Gregorian calendar) He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1989. The Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge, known simply as The Royal Society, is a Learned society for science that was founded in 1660

Contents 1 Life 2 Career 3 Cain reminisces on pre-war Oxford 4 References 5 Notable publications 6 External links

Life

Arthur James Cain was awarded an open scholarship in 1939 (Demyship) to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he graduated with first class honors in zoology in 1941. A demyship (or demy) is a form of Scholarship, specifically at Magdalen College Oxford. Magdalen College redirects here see also Magdalene College Cambridge Magdalen College (ˈmɔːdlɨn "maudlin" is one of the constituent Entering the British Army in December 1941, Cain was commissioned Second Lieutenant in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps (engineering) and was later transferred to the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (R. The British Army is the land armed forces branch of the British Armed Forces. Second Lieutenant is the lowest commissioned officer Military rank in many Armed forces. The Royal Army Ordnance Corps ( RAOC) was a former Corps of the British Army. The Corps of Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers ( REME; pronounced phonetically as "Reemee" is a Corps of the British Army that has E. M. E. ) on its formation. He was promoted to Captain in 1942.

After leaving the military in November 1945 Cain returned to Oxford to pursue research in the Department of Zoology. He became a Departmental Demonstrator in October 1946, and received his M. A. in November 1947. From January 1949 until 1964 Cain was employed as University Demonstrator (now referred to as Lecturer) in Animal Taxonomy.

Career

Cain's main interests lay in evolutionary biology, ecological genetics, animal taxonomy and speciation. Evolutionary biology is a sub-field of Biology concerned with the origin of Species from a Common descent, and Descent of species Ecological genetics is the study of Genetics in the context of the interactions among organisms and between the organisms and their environment Biological systematics is the study of the diversity of Life on the planet Earth both past and present and the relationships among living things through time Speciation is the Evolutionary process by which new biological Species arise

Though he conducted research with John Baker on the histochemistry of lipids, his main work lay in the field developed by E.B. Ford, namely, ecological genetics. Dr John Randal Baker FRS (1900-1984 was a biologist, physical anthropologist, and professor at the University of Oxford (where he was the Histology (from the Greek = 'tissue' is the study of the microscopic anatomy of cells and tissues of Plants and Lipids are broadly defined as any fat- Soluble ( lipophilic) naturally-occurring Molecule, such as fats oils waxes cholesterol sterols fat-soluble Professor Edmund Brisco "Henry" Ford FRS, Hon FRCP ( 23rd April 1901- 2nd January 1988 was a British ecological Ecological genetics is the study of Genetics in the context of the interactions among organisms and between the organisms and their environment With P.M. Sheppard Cain studied the ecological genetics of colour and banding polymorphisms in snails. Professor Philip MacDonald Sheppard, FRS ( 27 July 1921 &ndash 17 October 1976) was a British Geneticist and Polymorphism in biology occurs when two or more clearly different Phenotypes exist in the same population of a species — in other words the occurrence of more than one The word snail is a Common name that can be used for almost all members of the Molluscan class Gastropoda which have coiled shells in the Cain and Sheppard's work on Cepaea nemoralis, one of the first studies to demonstrate natural selection by predators acting on a colour polymorphism, is now regarded as a classic. The grove snail or brown-lipped snail ( Cepaea nemoralis) is one of the most common species of land Snail in Europe It generated a long series of further studies by Cain, including the formal genetic analysis of the variation, the discovery of area effects and the analysis of climatic influences. Genetic testing allows the genetic Diagnosis of vulnerabilities to inherited Diseases, and can also be used to determine a person's Ancestry. With John Currey he made elegant use of sub-fossil material to follow changes in time as well as space. Subfossil refers to remains whose Fossilization process is not complete either for lack of time or because the condition in which they were buried were not optimal for fossilization Later he turned to the study of variation in shell shape.

In population genetics he clarified the concept of adaptive value. The adaptive value represents the combined influence of all characters which affect the fitness of an individual or population He made important contributions to the theory and practice of taxonomy, the problems of homology, phyletic weighting and taxonomic importance, on the status of the genus, and on the relevance of natural selection to our understanding of variation between taxonomic categories. Taxonomy is the practice and science of classification The word comes from the Greek, taxis (meaning 'order' 'arrangement' and, nomos In Evolutionary biology, homology has come to mean any similarity between characters that is due to their shared ancestry. Cladistics is the hierarchical classification of Species based on evolutionary ancestry A genus (plural genera from Γένος Latin genus "descent family type gender" is a low-level Taxonomic Natural selection is the process by which favorable Heritable traits become more common in successive Generations of a Population of Taxonomy is the practice and science of classification The word comes from the Greek, taxis (meaning 'order' 'arrangement' and, nomos

Cain was appointed Curator of the Zoological Collections at the Oxford University Museum in 1954, a position he held for ten years in addition to his duties as University Lecturer and as Lecturer in Zoology at Saint Peter's College (1958-1961). Curator (from Latin cura care means manager overseer. A curator or keeper of a cultural heritage institution (e The Oxford University Museum of Natural History, sometimes known simply as the Oxford University Museum, is a Museum displaying many of the University of Oxford's In 1964, he left Oxford to become Professor of Zoology at the University of Manchester, and he later (1968) was appointed Derby Professor of Zoology at the University of Liverpool. The University of Manchester is a " red brick " civic University located in Manchester, England. The University of Liverpool is a University in the city of Liverpool, England. He received emeritus status at Liverpool upon his retirement in 1989. Emeritus (ɨˈmɛrɨtəs is an Adjective that is used in the title of a retired Professor, Bishop or other professional ^[1]

Cain reminisces on pre-war Oxford

Towards the end of his life Cain was persuaded to reminisce about the status of natural selection in pre-war Oxford and how it changed over the years of the modern evolutionary synthesis. Natural selection is the process by which favorable Heritable traits become more common in successive Generations of a Population of ^[2] The general attitude was sceptical of natural selection. Charles Elton, who led the emergence of ecology as a discipline, pointed out the arctic fox polymorphism, which can be found in all three tundra biomes of the northern palaeoarctic. Charles Elton may refer to Charles Isaac Elton (1839&ndash1900 English lawyer politician writer and antiquarian Charles Sutherland Elton Ecology (from Greek grc οἶκος oikos, "house(hold" and grc -λογία -logia) is the scientific study of The Arctic Fox ( Vulpes lagopus) also known as the White Fox or Snow Fox, is a small Fox native to cold Arctic regions of the In physical Geography, tundra is an area where the Tree growth is hindered by low temperatures and short growing seasons A biome is a climatically and geographically defined area of ecologically similar climatic conditions such as communities of Plants Animals and The Palearctic or Palaearctic is one of the eight Ecozones dividing the Earth surface Arctic foxes (Alopex lagopus) are dimorphic: the common morph ('white') is white in winter and brownish-grey dorsally in summer; the other morph ('blue') is light brown/blue in winter and dark brown in summer. The Arctic Fox ( Vulpes lagopus) also known as the White Fox or Snow Fox, is a small Fox native to cold Arctic regions of the The two morphs interbreed freely. Despite the obvious advantage of white in avoiding predation, blue is actually the most frequent morph in Iceland. Iceland, officially the Republic of Iceland ( ( Ísland or Lýðveldið Ísland ( Elton also gave a number of other examples which he claimed could not be explained by natural selection. ^[3]

"That very phenomenon which was to be used by Fisher & Ford in studies on natural selection is here shown by cogent argument and the facts of field natural history to be inexplicable by selection. But Elton knew that a far greater range of other characters have the same implications, namely, all, or nearly all, the differences (non-polymorphic) between closely related species. " (Cain, op. cit. p5)

Also, Robson and Richards^[4] "showed a surprising reluctance to allow any example of natural selection; their cautious qualification that characters were non-adaptive as far as they could see became, too often, a certainty that they were non-adaptive; and their arguments were sometimes one-sided. " Cain laid the blame on their "vitalistic or perhaps theistic attitudes. . . Robson and Richards were far from alone. Alister Hardy. Sir Alister Clavering Hardy ( 10 February 1896 &ndash 22 May 1985) was an Oxford -educated Marine biologist, expert on . . was an earnest Unitarian and certainly a vitalist" (p7). Vitalism, as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary is a doctrine that the functions of a living organism are due to a vital principle distinct from physicochemical . . In Cambridge matters were even worse" (p8, giving as examples W.H. Thorpe, Charles Raven, Sir James Gray and J. William Homan Thorpe FRS ( April 1, 1902 – April 7, 1986) was Professor of Animal Ethology at the University of Cambridge, and a James or Jim Gray may refer to Sir James Gray 1st Baronet (1667–1722 armiger and merchant-Burgess of Edinburgh Sir James Gray W. S. Pringle).

"What I wanted to know from all these great people was, how exactly did they know that a character was non-adaptive or neutral? They didn't know, and they couldn't know. " (Cain, op cit. ) "David Lack was the only religious man I knew at that period who did not allow his religion to dictate his view of natural selection. " (Cain p9). He might have added Ronald Fisher and Theodosius Dobzhansky, who were also believing Christians: Fisher from the start of his career was a leading proponent of natural selection. Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher, FRS ( 17 February 1890 – 29 July 1962) was an English Statistician, Evolutionary Theodosius Grygorovych Dobzhansky, also known

In contrast to many others, E.B. Ford appreciated that, even if a character was in itself non-adaptive, the gene or genes determining it might affect other, adaptive, characters which were always under selective influence. Professor Edmund Brisco "Henry" Ford FRS, Hon FRCP ( 23rd April 1901- 2nd January 1988 was a British ecological Ford understood the significance of pleiotropism, and knew of Fisher's demonstration that a neutral gene derived from a single mutation could only be in about the same number of individuals as there had been generations since its inception. Pleiotropy occurs when a single Gene influences multiple phenotypic traits Consequently a new Mutation in the gene will have an effect on all Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher, FRS ( 17 February 1890 – 29 July 1962) was an English Statistician, Evolutionary ^[5]

References

Notable publications

Cain A. J. 1954. Animal species and evolution. Hutchinson, London.

Cain A. J. 1968. Studies on Cepaea V. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 253, 499-517. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences, or Philosophical Transactions B, is a Scientific journal published by

Cain A. J. 1971. Colour and banding morphs in subfossil samples of the snail Cepaea. In Creed R. (ed) Ecological genetics and evolution. Blackwell, Oxford.

Cain A. J. 1977. The efficacy of natural selection in wild populations. In The changing scene in natural sciences. Special publication #12, 111-33. Academy of Natural Sciences.

Cain A. J. 1983. Ecology and ecogenetics of terrestrial molluscan populations. In Russell-Hunter W. D. (ed) The Mollusca vol 6, p597-647. Academic Press, N. Y.

Cain A. J. and Currey J. D. 1963a. Area effects in Cepaea. Phil Trans Roy Soc B 38, 269-299.

Cain A. J. and Currey J. D. 1963b. Area effects in Cepaea on the Larkhill Artillery Ranges, Salisbury Plain. J. Linnaean Soc London (Zoology) 45, 1-15.

Cain A. J. , King J. M. B. and Sheppard P. M. 1960. New data on the genetics of polymorphism in the snail Cepaea nemoralis. Genetics 45, 393-411.

Cain A. J. and Provine W. B. 1991. Genes and ecology in history. In Berry R. J. et al (eds) Genes in ecology: the 33rd Symposium of the British Ecological Society. Blackwell, Oxford.

Cain A. J. and Sheppard P. M. 1950. Selection in the polymorphic land snail Cepaea nemoralis (L. ). Heredity 4, 275-94.

Cain A. J. and Sheppard P. M. 1954. Natural selection in Cepaea. Genetics 39, 89-116.

Cain A. J. , Sheppard P. M. and King J. M. B. 1968. Studies on Cepaea I. The genetics of some morphs and varieties of Cepaea nemoralis (L. ). Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 253, 383-396. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences, or Philosophical Transactions B, is a Scientific journal published by

Clarke B. C. 1979. The evolution of genetic diversity. Proc Roy Soc B. 205, 453-474. [a general review]

Currey J. D. and Cain A. J. 1968. Climate and selection of banding morphs in Cepaea from the climate optimum to the present day. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 253, 483-98. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences, or Philosophical Transactions B, is a Scientific journal published by

External links

• http://www.amphilsoc.org/library/mole/c/cain.htm

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