The contibutions to the recent ongoing discussion of the
evolution of ageing make no mention of some key works in this
field. Here are three important references with excellent
details and long bibliographies to get the curious oriented.
1) Evolution of age-structured populations by
Brian Charlesworth, 1980, Cambridge Univ. Press
ISBN 0 521 29786 9 paperback
2) Evolution of Longevity in Animals, eds.
Avril D. Woodhead and Keith H. Thompson,
1987, Plenum Press ,ISBN 0-306-42692-7
3)Evolutionary Biology of Aging by Michael R. Rose,
1991, Oxford Univ. Press, ISBN 0-19-506133-0
I have seen no mention lately in the postings to this group
of the theoretical and experimental work done in recent years
in this field. The discussants are coming up with some possibly
novel hypotheses of value, but seem unamware of what has been done
to date in this field. For example the selection work with
Drosophila since the early 1980's. See refs 2 and 3 above for
details.
R. Nicholas Hoffmann
hoffmann at sci.ccny.cuny.edu
