GATE 2021 Syllabus for Ecology and Evolution (EY)

PDF download link of GATE 2021 Syllabus for Ecology and Evolution (EY) is given in the end of the article.

Syllabus for General Aptitude (GA) (common to all papers)

Section 1: Ecology

Fundamental concepts: Abiotic and biotic components; scales (population, species, community, ecosystems, biomes); niches and habitats.

Population ecology: Population growth rates (density dependent/independent); metapopulation ecology (colonization, persistence, extinction, patches, sources, sinks); age-structured populations.

Interactions: Types (mutualism, symbiosis, commensalism, competition, parasitism, predation, etc); ecophysiology (physiological adaptations to abiotic environment); prey-predator interactions (Lotka-Voltera equation etc)

Community ecology: Community assembly, organization and succession; species richness, evenness and diversity indices, species-area relationships; theory of island biogeography Ecosystems structure and function: trophic levels and their interactions; nutrient cycles; primary and secondary productivity.

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GATE 2021 Syllabus for Ecology and Evolution

Section 2: Evolution

History of Evolutionary thought: Lamarckism; Darwinism; Modern Synthesis

Fundamentals: Variation; heritability; natural selection; fitness and adaptation; types of selection (stabilizing, directional, disruptive)

Diversity of life: Origin and history of life on earth; diversity and classification of life; systems of classification (cladistics and phenetics)

Life history strategies: Allocation of resources; tradeoffs; r/K selection; semelparity and iteroparity

Interactions: Co-evolution (co-adaptations, arms race, Red Queen hypothesis, co-speciation); prey-predator interactions (mimicry, crypsis, etc)

Population and Quantitative genetics: Origins of genetic variation; Mendelian genetics; HardyWeinberg equilibrium; drift; selection (one-locus two-alleles model); population genetic structure (panmixia, gene flow, FST); polygenic traits; gene-environment interactions (phenotypic plasticity); heritability

Molecular evolution and phylogenetics: Neutral theory; molecular clocks; rates of evolution; phylogenetic reconstruction; molecular systematics

Macroevolution: Species concepts and speciation; adaptive radiation; convergence; biogeography.

GATE 2021 Syllabus for Ecology and Evolution

Section 3: Mathematics and Quantitative Ecology

Mathematics and statistics in ecology: Simple functions (linear, quadratic, exponential, logarithmic, etc); concept of derivatives and slope of a function; permutations and combinations; basic probability (probability of random events; sequences of events, etc); frequency distributions and their descriptive statistics (mean, variance, coefficient of variation, correlation, etc).

Statistical hypothesis testing: Concept of p-value; Type I and Type II error, test statistics like t-test and Chi-square test; basics of linear regression and ANOVA.

Section 4: Behavioural Ecology

Classical Ethology: Instinct; fixed action patters; imprinting; learnt behavior; proximate and ultimate questions

Sensory ecology: Neuroethology; communication (chemical, acoustic and visual signaling); recognition systems

Foraging ecology: Foraging behaviour; optimal foraging theory

Reproduction: Cost of sex; sexual dimorphism; mate choice; sexual selection (runaway selection, good-genes, handicap principle, etc); sexual conflict; mating systems; parental care

Social living: Costs and benefits of group-living (including responses to predators); effect of competition (scramble and contest) on group formation; dominance relationships; eusociality; kin selection; altruism; reciprocity; human behaviour.

GATE 2021 Syllabus for Ecology and Evolution

Section 5: Applied Ecology & Evolution

Biodiversity and conservation: Importance of conserving biodiversity; ecosystem services; threats to biodiversity; invasive species; in-situ conservation (endemism, biodiversity hotspots, protected areas); ex-situ conservation; conservation genetics (genetic diversity, inbreeding depression); DNA fingerprinting and DNA barcoding.

Disease ecology and evolution: Epidemiology; zoonotic diseases; antibiotic resistance; vector Control Plant and animal breeding: Marker assisted breeding; genetic basis of economically important traits.

Global climate change: Causes; consequences; mitigation.

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