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1 导读 长期以来，澳大利亚的犬类被分为本地野狗、家犬和它们的混血后代。人们对野狗的看法存在分歧，部分人认为它们威胁牲畜，而另一些人强调其文化意义和生态价值。混血犬则常被视为清除对象。 然而，新的基因检测技术颠覆了这一认知。2023年，新南威尔士大学的凯莉·凯恩斯发表的研究表明，70%的野生澳洲野狗样本中没有家犬血统，且未发现第一代杂交后代。同年10月，墨尔本大学的安德鲁·威克斯进一步研究发现，澳洲野狗与家犬的杂交极为罕见，它们正逐渐演化为独立物种。 尽管如此，澳大利亚大部分地区仍在进行清除行动，只有维多利亚州部分保护基因隔离的野狗种群。科学家建议采用非致命措施，如电围栏和护卫犬，并研究全基因组测序技术以更深入地了解野狗的起源和身份。 【文末有原刊获取和免费入群方式】  2 ｜原文｜翻译｜字词｜ Know the dingo 认识野狗 Australia's wild canines are on track to becoming a distinct species 澳大利亚的野生犬科动物正在成为一个独特的物种 Until very recently, it was assumed that Australian canines came in three varieties. There were native dingoes roaming the bush, distant cousins of dogs that arrived from Asia thousands of years ago. Then came domestic dogs, introduced in recent centuries by European travellers. Last were mongrel descendants of escaped pets and native dingoes. 直到最近，人们还认为澳大利亚的犬类有三种类型。有在灌木丛中游荡的本地野狗（dingoes），它们是数千年前从亚洲迁徙而来的狗的远亲。接着是家犬，它们是在近几个世纪由欧洲旅行者引入的。最后是逃逸宠物和本地野狗的混血后代。 Views on domestic dogs are straightforward: good as pets, but a threat when feral. Dingoes are more divisive. Many farmers see them as a threat to livestock and want them culled. But others are protective of this native animal, which is culturally important for Aboriginal people and helps balance the continent’s ecosystems. 人们对家犬的看法很简单：作为宠物很好，但如果是野性动物则会构成威胁。而对澳洲野狗的看法则更为分歧。许多农民认为它们对牲畜构成威胁，希望将其清除。但另一些人则保护这种本地动物，因为它对土著人民具有文化意义，还能帮助平衡大陆的生态系统。 Dingo-dog mixes, however, are an easier target for everyone. Still a menace to sheep, but also a conservation threat to the native dingoes, they can be culled without much controversy. Such culls often target “wild dogs”, a catch-all category which includes dingoes, feral dogs and mixes, but in areas closer to humans where no true dingoes were thought to live. However, new genetic-testing techniques have caused a stir by suggesting that dingo-dog hybrids are vanishingly rare. The majority of Australian canines being culled are, therefore, pure-bred dingoes. 然而，澳洲野狗与家犬的混血犬却成了众矢之的。它们仍然是羊群的威胁，同时对本地澳洲野狗的保护也构成威胁，因此可以毫无争议地将其清除。这种清除行动通常针对“野狗”，这是一个笼统的类别，包括澳洲野狗、野狗和混血犬，但主要在被认为没有真正的澳洲野狗生活的、更靠近人类活动区域的地方进行。然而，新的基因检测技术却引发了争议，因为它表明澳洲野狗与家犬的杂交后代极为罕见。因此，被清除的大多数澳大利亚犬类实际上是纯种的澳洲野狗。  canine /ˈkeɪnaɪn/ - adj.犬的；似犬的；犬科的 dingo /ˈdɪŋɡəʊ/ - n.澳洲野犬 roam /rəʊm/ - v.漫游；漫步；闲逛 cousin /ˈkʌzn/ - n.表妹；表兄(或弟、姊、妹)；堂兄(或弟、姊、妹) mongrel /ˈmʌŋɡrəl/ - n.杂种；杂种狗 feral /ˈferəl/ - adj.野性的；野生的 livestock /ˈlaɪvstɒk/ - n.牲畜；家畜 Aboriginal /ˌæbəˈrɪdʒənl/ - 原住民；土著人；澳洲土著 menace /ˈmenəs/ - n.威胁；恐吓；烦人的人 controversy /ˈkɒntrəvɜːsi/ - n.争议；(公开的)争论，辩论 stir /stɜː(r)/ - n.搅拌；搅动；(一些人感到的)激动，愤怒，震动pure-bred /ˈpjʊə bred/ - adj.纯种的  The turning-point came with a paper published in Molecular Ecology in 2023 by Kylie Cairns at the University of New South Wales. She and her team compared the genomes of 391 wild and captive “dingoes” from across Australia—some expected to be native, others mixed—with genomes of 152 domestic dogs. This was done by zeroing in on 195,474 points in their genetic code where the two groups might be expected to have different DNA. The results showed that 70% of the wild dingoes sampled had no dog ancestry. What’s more, no feral dogs nor first-generation dingo-dog hybrids were identified. “It gave us a different picture than we were expecting,” Dr Cairns says. 转折点出现在2023年由新南威尔士大学的凯莉·凯恩斯（Kylie Cairns）发表在《分子生态学》上的一篇论文。她和她的团队比较了来自澳大利亚各地的391只野生和圈养“澳洲野狗”的基因组（其中一些被认为是本地的，另一些是混血的），并与152只家犬的基因组进行了比较。研究通过关注两个群体可能具有不同DNA的195,474个遗传代码点来进行分析。结果显示，70%的野生澳洲野狗样本中没有狗的血统。此外，没有发现野狗或第一代澳洲野狗与狗的杂交后代。“这给我们呈现了一个与我们预期不同的画面，”凯恩斯博士说。 A further round of DNA analysis, published in Evolution Letters in October, suggests the paper from 2023 may, if anything, have underestimated the level of dingo purity. This study, led by Andrew Weeks at the University of Melbourne (and including data provided by Dr Cairns), focused on the dingo-dog hybrids identified in previous research, concluding that the genetic signals marking these animals as hybrids originated thousands of years ago when dingo and dog first split. In fact, they concluded, dingo-dog mixing hardly ever happens—and, when it does, the descendants rarely go on to have offspring of their own. Dingoes, in other words, have preferentially bred with dingoes for so long that they are now on a trajectory towards becoming an entirely new species. 2023年10月发表在《进化信函》上的另一轮DNA分析表明，2023年的论文可能低估了澳洲野狗的纯度。这项研究由墨尔本大学的安德鲁·威克斯（Andrew Weeks）领导（并包括凯恩斯博士提供的数据），专注于之前研究中识别的澳洲野狗与狗的杂交后代，得出结论认为，这些动物作为杂交后代的遗传信号起源于数千年前，当时澳洲野狗和狗首次分离。事实上，他们得出结论，澳洲野狗与狗的杂交几乎从未发生——即使发生，后代也很少有后代。换句话说，澳洲野狗长期以来优先与澳洲野狗交配，它们正朝着成为一种全新物种的方向发展。 The findings are not all that surprising. Escaped domestic dogs are unlikely to survive for long in the bush, and any that wander up to a healthy dingo pack are much more likely to be attacked than mated with. The irony of culling dingoes is that, by disrupting their social structures and crashing their populations, it may make desperate dingoes more likely to start mating with domestic dogs. 这些发现并不令人惊讶。逃逸的家犬不太可能在灌木丛中存活太久，而那些徘徊到健康的澳洲野狗群附近的狗更有可能被攻击而不是交配。清除澳洲野狗的讽刺之处在于，通过破坏它们的社会结构并减少它们的数量，可能会使绝望的澳洲野狗更有可能开始与家犬交配。 genome /ˈdʒiːnəʊm/ - n.基因组；染色体组 captive /ˈkæptɪv/ - adj.被监禁的；被关起来的；受控制的；被困住的 ancestry /ˈænsestri/ - n.血统；祖先；(统称)祖宗 underestimate /ˌʌndərˈestɪmeɪt/ - vt.低估；对…估计不足；轻视 bred /bred/ - v.饲养，培育(动植物)；孕育；交配繁殖 trajectory /trəˈdʒektəri/ - n.轨迹；(射体在空中的)轨道；弹道 wander /ˈwɒndə(r)/ - v.漫步；游荡；徘徊；流浪；漫游；闲逛 irony /ˈaɪrəni/ - n.讽刺；反语 Despite the revelations, Australian state authorities and farmers have largely continued with culls. The Victoria state government, one of the few exceptions, now protects a genetically isolated population of dingoes in its north-west, shown by the recent studies to be at imminent risk of dying out, while still permitting lethal control of dingoes in its eastern region. 尽管有这些发现，澳大利亚各州政府和农民仍在继续进行清除行动。维多利亚州政府是少数例外之一，现在保护其西北部的一个基因隔离的野狗种群，最近的研究显示这个种群濒临灭绝，但仍在其东部地区允许对野狗进行致命控制。 Compromises are possible. Non-lethal measures, such as electric fencing and guard dogs, could be deployed more widely. Researchers are also investigating chemical compounds in male dingo urine which could be used as a deterrent. 可以达成妥协。非致命措施，如电围栏和护卫犬，可以更广泛地部署。研究人员还在研究雄性澳洲野狗尿液中的化学物质，这些物质可以作为威慑剂。 As the debate around dingo control continues, Dr Cairns is excited by a yet more powerful genetic technology: whole-genome sequencing. It allows scientists to look at the entire DNA sequence of an animal, rather than an array of different points. This could help researchers dig even deeper into dingoes’ identity and finally unearth the story of their origins. 随着关于野狗控制的辩论继续进行，凯恩斯博士对一种更强大的基因技术——全基因组测序感到兴奋。它允许科学家查看动物的整个DNA序列，而不是一系列不同的点。这可能有助于研究人员更深入地挖掘野狗的身份，并最终揭开它们起源的故事。  revelation /ˌrevəˈleɪʃn/ - n.被暴露的真相；披露，揭露；展现，显示；（惊人的）新发现 imminent /ˈɪmɪnənt/ - adj.迫在眉睫的；即将发生的；临近的lethal /ˈliːθl/ - adj.致命的；可致死的；危害极大的 investigate /ɪnˈvestɪɡeɪt/ - v.调查(某人)；研究；侦查(某事)urine /ˈjʊərɪn/ - n.尿；小便 deterrent /dɪˈterənt/ - n.威慑因素；遏制力unearth /ʌnˈɜːθ/ - vt.发掘；(偶然或经搜寻)发现，找到  完 文章【点赞】+【分享】+【推荐】后，后台截图留言即可获取今日文章外刊资源。 来源：经济学人｜科学与技术 本文内容选自外部来源，文章中的观点和立场仅代表作者本人，与本公众号无关。本公众号对文章内容的准确性、可靠性或完整性不承担任何责任，亦不对其可能产生的任何后果负责。我们转载此文仅供读者参考，不构成任何形式的建议或推荐。 外刊免费分享群限时开放 扫描下方二维码，限时免费加入外刊分享群。群里会不定期分享外刊资料，该群只限于学习交流，禁止乱发消息和打广告，否则一律踢除。如二维码失效，可关注公众号，即可获取入群方式。  经济学人和更多外刊获取 后台发送"2025"，可订阅经济学人（格式pdf、docx、mobi、epub、mp3.zip）。 后台发送"more"，获取更多最新外刊。 |
