"PhD Studentship: The impacts of cooperation on inbreeding depression in the wild"

BACKGROUND: Negative effects of inbreeding on components of fitness (inbreeding depression) are well documented, but the extent to which social behaviour may mitigate such effects in animal societies is largely unknown. This is perhaps surprising, as social species exhibit a high potential both for inbreeding (typically living in kin-structured populations) and for cooperative behaviour to mitigate the negative effects of inbreeding. Recent evidence, from studies of non-social species, that the effects of inbreeding can indeed be mitigated by good environmental conditions lends strength to this possibility.

[...] AIM: To test for the first time whether cooperative behaviour can indeed mitigate the negative effects of inbreeding, using a long-term field study of the cooperatively breeding white-browed sparrow weaver as a model system. Sparrow-weaver parents are assisted with the rearing of their offspring by 0-12 helpers, which lighten parental workloads and increase the total rate at which the chicks are provisioned. The project will therefore investigate the extent to which helpers mitigate the effects of inbreeding on the fitness of both parents and offspring.

Isn't it great, how humans are able to get extended family - parents, siblings, uncles, aunts, in-laws - to help raise our children? Social factors are extremely important for the success of human genes, more than for most species.

This is exactly the kind of research needed. Hopefully there will be more and more like this in the coming years as evolutionary biologists start to realize how badly understood endogamy is. I hope this project gets plenty of funding.