Evolution

The Evolution Of The Appendix Solved?

The lowly appendix used to get no respect and was simply regarded as a useless evolutionary artifact but two years ago researchers at Duke University Medical Center proposed that it actually serves a critical function as a safe haven where good bacteria co ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 21 2009 - 3:07pm

Search for the Wild Human

Can even the human form grow tiring? This ORGY of a culture we presuppose to be endlessly entertaining- perpetually self-gratifying- could it all be an elementary school yard game? Our brains are slowly connecting the dots- understanding that humans are no ...

Blog Post - Scott Black - Aug 25 2009 - 11:15pm

Feathers- Bringing You Iridescent Colors For 40 Million Years

Birds have a wide variety of vibrant plumages and have evolved various chemical and physical mechanisms to produce these beautiful colors over millions of years.  When did feathers first get iridescence, the quality of changing color depending on the angle ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 8 2010 - 6:56pm

Lamarckian Experimentalist Paul Kammerer- Fraud Or Founder Of Epigenetics?

Should early 20th century researcher Paul Kammerer be credited as the founder of epigenetics?   It would certainly be a dramatic change from current perceptions of his work. Kammerer, a leading proponent of the Lamarckian theory of evolution, achieved glob ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 2 2009 - 3:02pm

Fossilized "Squid" Ink Still Good!

Belemnoteuthis antiquus is technically not a squid, but a belemnite. Belemnites were the first cephalopods (as far as we know) to develop the ingeniously internalized shell that led to the radiation of nearly all modern cephalopods--octopus, squid, and cu ...

Blog Post - Danna Staaf - Sep 4 2009 - 4:50pm

Super Sperm- An Evolutionary Reason For Infertility?

About 10% of couples who want a baby have fertility problems and causes offered tend to break down around advocacy issues; environmentalists blame pollution while psychiatrists point to our stressful lifestyles, but evolutionary biologist Dr. Oren Hasson ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 8 2009 - 10:29am

Darwin Matrix

I have updated the free Darwin Matrix wallpaper that is available at Evolver Zone. You can find it in different desktop sizes over at EZ. ...

Blog Post - T. Ryan Gregory - Sep 11 2009 - 7:04am

Breaking News: Evidence For Evolution Found!

One of Doug Futuyma's great quotes is this one: "...no biologist today would think of publishing a paper on ‘new evidence for evolution’... it simply hasn’t been an issue in scientific circles for more than a century."- Futuyma, 1998 Evoluti ...

Article - T. Ryan Gregory - Sep 14 2009 - 9:38pm

The evolution of eyes

Some of you already will know about the special issue of Evolution: Education and Outreach on the evolution of eyes that I edited last year (see below). There is now another excellent collection of papers on this subject in Philosophical Transactions of th ...

Blog Post - T. Ryan Gregory - Sep 11 2009 - 7:31am

From non-coding to coding genes

I sometimes get asked if non-coding elements (usually "junk DNA" is what they say) can ever evolve into genes. I usually say that transposable elements, at least, can be coopted into functional roles, and that it wouldn't be so odd if a pseu ...

Blog Post - T. Ryan Gregory - Sep 11 2009 - 7:37am