Evolving Better Cars

2014 ◽  
Vol 76 (4) ◽  
pp. 259-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne M. Royer ◽  
Elizabeth H. Schultheis
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Local Adaptation ◽  
Computer Applications ◽  
Online Program ◽  
Virtual Population ◽  
Evolution By Natural Selection ◽  
Long Timescales ◽  
Independent Inquiry

Evolutionary experiments are usually difficult to perform in the classroom because of the large sizes and long timescales of experiments testing evolutionary hypotheses. Computer applications give students a window to observe evolution in action, allowing them to gain comfort with the process of natural selection and facilitating inquiry experimentation. The lesson described here uses a free online program, BoxCar2D, to demonstrate evolution by natural selection in a virtual population of cars. Students will be introduced to the principles of evolution and conduct independent inquiry projects on key predictions from evolution – including convergence, local adaptation, and the role of mutation in adaptation.

scholarly journals Local adaptation and sexual selection drive intra-island diversification in a songbird lineage: differential divergence in autosomes and sex chromosomes

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yann XC Bourgeois ◽  
Joris AM Bertrand ◽  
Boris Delahaie ◽  
Hélène Holota ◽  
Christophe Thébaud ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Reproductive Isolation ◽  
Local Adaptation ◽  
Sex Chromosomes ◽  
Genomic Variation ◽  
Color Variation ◽  
Mating Signals ◽  
Genome Wide

AbstractRecently diverged taxa showing marked phenotypic and ecological diversity are optimal systems to test the relative importance of two major evolutionary mechanisms, adaptation to local ecological conditions by natural selection, or mechanisms of reproductive isolation such as assortative mating mediated by sexually selected mating signals or post-zygotic incompatibilities. Whereas local adaptation is expected to affect many loci throughout the genome, traits acting as mating signals are expected to be located on sex chromosomes and have a simple genetic basis. We used genome-wide markers to test these predictions in Reunion Island’s gray-white eye (Zosterops borbonicus), which has recently diversified into five distinct plumage forms. Two of them correspond to a polymorphic highland population that is separated by a steep ecological gradient from three distinct lowland forms that show narrow contact zones in plumage color traits, yet no association with environmental variables. An analysis of population structure using genome-wide SNP loci revealed two major clades corresponding to highland and lowland forms, respectively, with the latter separated further into three independent lineages corresponding to plumage forms. Coalescent tests of alternative demographic scenarios provided support for divergence of highland and lowland lineages with an intensification of gene flow in the last 60,000 years. Landscapes of genomic variation revealed that signatures of selection associated with elevation are found at multiple regions across the genome, whereas most loci associated with the lowland forms are located on the Z sex chromosome. A gene ontology analysis identified TYRP1, a Z-linked color gene, as a likely candidate locus underlying color variation among lowland forms. Our results are consistent with the role of natural selection in driving the divergence of locally adapted highland populations, and the role of sexual selection in differentiating lowland forms through reproductive isolation mechanisms, showing that both modes of lineage divergence can take place at very small geographic scales in birds.

Randomness and Complexity

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven E. Vigdor
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Mechanics ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Rna World ◽  
Biological Evolution ◽  
Variable Theory ◽  
Cosmological Natural Selection ◽  
Einstein Podolsky Rosen ◽  
World Hypothesis ◽  
Rna World Hypothesis

Chapter 7 describes the fundamental role of randomness in quantum mechanics, in generating the first biomolecules, and in biological evolution. Experiments testing the Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen paradox have demonstrated, via Bell’s inequalities, that no local hidden variable theory can provide a viable alternative to quantum mechanics, with its fundamental randomness built in. Randomness presumably plays an equally important role in the chemical assembly of a wide array of polymer molecules to be sampled for their ability to store genetic information and self-replicate, fueling the sort of abiogenesis assumed in the RNA world hypothesis of life’s beginnings. Evidence for random mutations in biological evolution, microevolution of both bacteria and antibodies and macroevolution of the species, is briefly reviewed. The importance of natural selection in guiding the adaptation of species to changing environments is emphasized. A speculative role of cosmological natural selection for black-hole fecundity in the evolution of universes is discussed.

scholarly journals The role of historical factors and natural selection in the evolution of breeding systems of Oxalis alpina in the Sonoran desert ‘Sky Islands’

2010 ◽  
Vol 23 (10) ◽  
pp. 2163-2175 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. PÉREZ-ALQUICIRA ◽  
F. E. MOLINA-FREANER ◽  
D. PIÑERO ◽  
S. G. WELLER ◽  
E. MARTÍNEZ-MEYER ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Sonoran Desert ◽  
Breeding Systems ◽  
Sky Islands ◽  
Historical Factors

The role of local adaptation in metapopulation restorations

2003 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 255-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandre Robert ◽  
Denis Couvet ◽  
François Sarrazin
Keyword(s):  
Local Adaptation

On the Origin of Theories: Charles Darwin’s Vocabulary of Method

2017 ◽  
Vol 122 (4) ◽  
pp. 1079-1104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henry M. Cowles
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Practice ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Historical Imagination ◽  
Theory Of Evolution ◽  
John Herschel ◽  
Scientific World ◽  
Evolution By Natural Selection ◽  
Selection Of

Abstract This is an essay on the origin of theories. It argues that methodology can do more than shape scientific theories—sometimes, vocabularies of method become such theories. The origin of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection is a case in point: Darwin’s well-known attention to methodological matters not only framed but bled into his theory of nature. A careful student of contemporary methodology, Darwin sought guidance for using a controversial tool in the scientific world in which he came of age: the hypothesis. In the process of reading the works of John Herschel and William Whewell, Darwin turned nature itself into a man of science. The hypotheses and testing of scientific practice were mirrored in the variations and selection of the natural world. Though unintentional, Darwin’s naturalization of a vocabulary of method helped pave the way for applications of evolutionary theory to the study of the human mind and, completing the circle, to the philosophy of science. Considering the role of vocabularies of method in the origin of theories suggests new directions for the study of cognitive history and the power of language to transform the historical imagination.

Pregnancy as a Factor of Adaptive Human Evolution. The Role of Natural Selection in the Origin of Preeclampsia

2021 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-35
Author(s):  
V. N. Serebrova ◽  
E. A. Trifonova ◽  
V. A. Stepanov
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Human Evolution
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