Cities as a "arenas" of micro -evolutionary processes. Changes in behavior and population structure, selection of genotypes in “urban” bird populations. Friedman V.S., Suslov V.V.

Discussing the urbanization of "wild" species of birds and mammals, scientists consider two mechanisms of occurring changes. The first concept, which is currently common in the West, states that during urbanization a kind of domestication occurs similar to the changes described during the domestication of foxes, minks and other animals. The second concept proposed by the authors suggests that when mastering cities, “wild” species of birds and mammals invasion into an extreme environment and adapt to its most general parameters, because their physiology and genetics change towards a positive attitude to the novelty, the best differentiation of what is happening around In conditions of anxiety, greater accuracy of actions in these conditions - like anthropogenesis.

This book is written in a refutation of the first concept and in evidence of the second. Analyzing the data on the ecology and the behavior of “urban” populations of many species of birds, reptiles and mammals, the authors show that these data refute the hypothesis of “urbanization as domestication” and support and develop the hypothesis of “urbanization as invasion into an extreme environment, similar to anthropogenesis”. The material, ideas and conclusions of the book can say something new and interesting not only about the development of cities with “wild” types of vertebrates, but also about such unrelated areas as anthropogenesis and “plant urbanization”.

It will be useful to a wide range of specialists involved in the problems of urbanization of biological species, evolutionary biology (parallelism, homological ranks of N. I. Vavilov and E. D. Kopa, fast adaptive evolution in small populations), related issues of ecology and genetics, as well as all readers, as well as to all readers, interested in the problems under consideration.