Increased production has been the major goal of animal breeding for many decades, and the correlated side-effects have grown to become a major issue in animal welfare. In this paper, the main genetic mechanisms in which such side-effects may occur are reviewed with examples from our own research in chickens. Pleiotropy, linkage and regulatory pathways are the most important means by which a number of traits may be affected simultaneously by the same selection pressure. Pleiotropy can be exemplified by the gene PMEL17 which causes a lack of black pigmentation in chickens and, simultaneously, predisposes them to become the victims of feather pecking. Linkage is a probable reason why a limited region on chicken chromosome 1 affects many different traits, such as growth, reproduction and fear-related behaviour. Gene regulation is affected by stress, and may cause modifications in behaviour and phenotype which are transferred from parents to offspring by means of epigenetic modifications. Insights into phenomena, such as these, may increase our understanding not only of how artificial selection works, but also evolution at large.

Soient $S$ un schéma nœthérien et $f:X\rightarrow S$ un morphisme propre. D’après SGA 4 XIV, pour tout faisceau constructible $\mathscr{F}$ de $\mathbb{Z}/n\mathbb{Z}$-modules sur $X$, les faisceaux de $\mathbb{Z}/n\mathbb{Z}$-modules $\mathtt{R}^{i}f_{\star }\mathscr{F}$, obtenus par image directe (pour la topologie étale), sont également constructibles : il existe une stratification $\mathfrak{S}$ de $S$ telle que ces faisceaux soient localement constants constructibles sur les strates. À la suite de travaux de N. Katz et G. Laumon, ou L. Illusie, dans le cas particulier où $S$ est génériquement de caractéristique nulle ou bien les faisceaux $\mathscr{F}$ sont constants (de torsion inversible sur $S$), on étudie ici la dépendance de $\mathfrak{S}$ en $\mathscr{F}$. On montre qu’une condition naturelle de constructibilité et modération « uniforme » satisfaite par les faisceaux constants, introduite par O. Gabber, est stable par les foncteurs $\mathtt{R}^{i}f_{\star }$. Si $f$ n’est pas supposé propre, ce résultat subsiste sous réserve de modération à l’infini, relativement à $S$. On démontre aussi l’existence de bornes uniformes sur les nombres de Betti, qui s’appliquent notamment pour les fibres des faisceaux $\mathtt{R}^{i}f_{\star }\mathbb{F}_{\ell }$, où $\ell$ parcourt les nombres premiers inversibles sur $S$.

Shelah has provided sufficient conditions for an ${\Bbb L}_{\omega _1 ,\omega } $-sentence ψ to have arbitrarily large models and for a Morley-like theorem to hold of ψ. These conditions involve structural and set-theoretic assumptions on all the ${\aleph _n}$’s. Using tools of Boney, Shelah, and the second author, we give assumptions on ${\aleph _0}$ and ${\aleph _1}$ which suffice when ψ is restricted to be universal:

Theorem.Assume${2^{{\aleph _0}}} < {2^{{\aleph _1}}}$. Let ψ be a universal ${\Bbb L}_{\omega _1 ,\omega } $-sentence.

1. (1) If ψ is categorical in${\aleph _0}$and$1 \leqslant {\Bbb L}\left( {\psi ,\aleph _1 } \right) < 2^{\aleph _1 } $, then ψ has arbitrarily large models and categoricity of ψ in some uncountable cardinal implies categoricity of ψ in all uncountable cardinals.

2. (2) If ψ is categorical in${\aleph _1}$, then ψ is categorical in all uncountable cardinals.

The theorem generalizes to the framework of ${\Bbb L}_{\omega _1 ,\omega } $-definable tame abstract elementary classes with primes.

In the context of abstract elementary classes (AECs) with a monster model, several possible definitions of superstability have appeared in the literature. Among them are no long splitting chains, uniqueness of limit models, and solvability. Under the assumption that the class is tame and stable, we show that (asymptotically) no long splitting chains implies solvability and uniqueness of limit models implies no long splitting chains. Using known implications, we can then conclude that all the previously-mentioned definitions (and more) are equivalent:

• Corollary.LetKbe a tame AEC with a monster model. Assume thatKis stable in a proper class of cardinals. The following are equivalent:

  1. (1) For all high-enough λ,Khas no long splitting chains.

  2. (2) For all high-enough λ, there exists a good λ-frame on a skeleton ofKλ.

  3. (3) For all high-enough λ,Khas a unique limit model of cardinality λ.

  4. (4) For all high-enough λ,Khas a superlimit model of cardinality λ.

  5. (5) For all high-enough λ, the union of any increasing chain of λ-saturated models is λ-saturated.

  6. (6) There exists μ such that for all high-enough λ,Kis (λ,μ) -solvable.

This gives evidence that there is a clear notion of superstability in the framework of tame AECs with a monster model.

We show that a number of results on abstract elementary classes (AECs) hold in accessible categories with concrete directed colimits. In particular, we prove a generalization of a recent result of Boney on tameness under a large cardinal assumption. We also show that such categories support a robust version of the Ehrenfeucht–Mostowski construction. This analysis has the added benefit of producing a purely language-free characterization of AECs, and highlights the precise role played by the coherence axiom.

We prove that any tame abstract elementary class categorical in a suitable cardinal has an eventually global good frame: a forking-like notion defined on all types of single elements. This gives the first known general construction of a good frame in ZFC. We show that we already obtain a well-behaved independence relation assuming only a superstability-like hypothesis instead of categoricity. These methods are applied to obtain an upward stability transfer theorem from categoricity and tameness, as well as new conditions for uniqueness of limit models.

We show that Shelah’s Eventual Categoricity Conjecture for successors follows from the existence of class many strongly compact cardinals. This is the first time the consistency of this conjecture has been proven. We do so by showing that every AEC with LS(K) below a strongly compact cardinal κ is < κ-tame and applying the categoricity transfer of Grossberg and VanDieren [11]. These techniques also apply to measurable and weakly compact cardinals and we prove similar tameness results under those hypotheses. We isolate a dual property to tameness, called type shortness, and show that it follows similarly from large cardinals.

Given a real analytic set $X$ in a complex manifold and a positive integer $d$, denote by ${{\mathcal{A}}^{d}}$ the set of points $p$ in $X$ at which there exists a germ of a complex analytic set of dimension $d$ contained in $X$. It is proved that ${{\mathcal{A}}^{d}}$ is a closed semianalytic subset of $X$.