Selecting the right project is critical for an organisation's success because resources are limited. From an economics perspective, the loss in opportunity for an organisation in doing the wrong project is expensive. This investment can be used for doing the right project for achieving competitive advantage and implementing business strategies. As a result, there are many frameworks with techniques and tools available in the literature for assisting organisations in project selection and prioritisation. All techniques or tools have their own advantages and disadvantages and these frameworks do not fit “one for all”. The framework can be business specific; therefore it is necessary to understand what the targeted industry considers as the “best practice”.

Understanding the maintenance of the variation that is typically observed in natural populations has been a central aim of evolutionary biology. In a feral population of Soay sheep on the island of Hirta, St. Kilda there is a phenotypic polymorphism for horns with males growing either normal or reduced (scurred) horns, and females growing either normal, scurred or no (polled) horns, with further variation in horn size within each of the horn types. This thesis examines the potential factors which maintain these polymorphisms. I first present an overview of the literature relating to the factors that potentially maintain variance in traits in natural populations. In chapter two I present an analysis that suggests that polymorphisms in both horn type and horn size may be maintained by trade-offs between allocation to reproductive success and survival in males, and by sexually antagonistic selection between males and females. In chapter three I test the hypothesis that female weaponry may convey an advantage in intrasexual conflicts over resources, rather than just being expressed as a consequence of genetic associations with the male phenotype. Chapter four examines the environmental factors which create variation between individuals in their horn length, revealing that individuals vary in response to the environment. In chapter five I investigate whether the temporally fluctuating environmental conditions of St. Kilda generate fluctuating selection on the horn length of normal-horned males, revealing that this mechanism constrains the evolution of horn length potentially maintaining variance. In chapter six I examine the genetic relationships between morphological traits, revealing that these relationships are dependent upon the environmental conditions experienced during the first year of life. Finally, I discuss the wider implications of these findings for our understanding of the maintenance of trait variation in the wild.

In this study I present a new mechanism for the evolution of male display as a consequence of female choice. I use a population genetic model to show that if female preferences for better males are based on a cue that is an integral part of male adaptation, a display may evolve if it amplifies the variance in this cue, and hence increases female resolution power with respect to male quality. This evolutionary mechanism is used as a core of a theory that explains the evolution of male display and adaptive female choice (i.e. female preferences that evolve because of their association with high quality genes). I argue that because an amplifying display (termed "amplifier") decreases mating success of males of poor quality, modifiers are likely to evolve that decrease the expression of the amplifier when associated with the poor quality males. As a result, the amplifier's expression becomes an indicator of male quality, and provides sufficient conditions for the evolution of a new type of female choice that is based on the amplifier's expression. This process may lead, in turn, to further changes in both female choice and male display, emphasizing either the amplifying effect of displays or their indicating effect. I show that the direction of these changes may depend on the cost that the amplifier confers on male viability, and on the degree of polygyny of the mating system in concern. I also outline explicit predictions for empirical tests.

This item was digitized as part of the Million Books Project led by Carnegie Mellon University and supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Cornell University coordinated the participation of land-grant and agricultural libraries in providing historical agricultural information for the digitization project; the University of Arizona Libraries, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Office of Arid Lands Studies collaborated in the selection and provision of material for the digitization project.

This item was digitized as part of the Million Books Project led by Carnegie Mellon University and supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Cornell University coordinated the participation of land-grant and agricultural libraries in providing historical agricultural information for the digitization project; the University of Arizona Libraries, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Office of Arid Lands Studies collaborated in the selection and provision of material for the digitization project.

This item was digitized as part of the Million Books Project led by Carnegie Mellon University and supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Cornell University coordinated the participation of land-grant and agricultural libraries in providing historical agricultural information for the digitization project; the University of Arizona Libraries, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Office of Arid Lands Studies collaborated in the selection and provision of material for the digitization project.

This item was digitized as part of the Million Books Project led by Carnegie Mellon University and supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Cornell University coordinated the participation of land-grant and agricultural libraries in providing historical agricultural information for the digitization project; the University of Arizona Libraries, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Office of Arid Lands Studies collaborated in the selection and provision of material for the digitization project.

This item was digitized as part of the Million Books Project led by Carnegie Mellon University and supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Cornell University coordinated the participation of land-grant and agricultural libraries in providing historical agricultural information for the digitization project; the University of Arizona Libraries, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Office of Arid Lands Studies collaborated in the selection and provision of material for the digitization project.

This item was digitized as part of the Million Books Project led by Carnegie Mellon University and supported by grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Cornell University coordinated the participation of land-grant and agricultural libraries in providing historical agricultural information for the digitization project; the University of Arizona Libraries, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the Office of Arid Lands Studies collaborated in the selection and provision of material for the digitization project. / Variety selection tests for Graham County, Maricopa County, Pinal County, and Yuma County

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