Year: 2022

RAPID EVOLUTION EXAMPLES. “Colour patterns and life-history traits in guppies introduced to new predator environments, work on life-history traits in mosquitofish introduced to Hawaii, and work on phenotypic traits in rabbits introduced to New Zealand.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

EYE OF THE BEHOLDER. “Short-term studies often find dramatic and rapid rates of phenotypic change, whereas long-term studies seem to manifest much slower rates of change.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

GLOBALIZATION IMPACT. “Since humans are reshaping selective environments across the globe, contemporary evolution may be more frequent, and directional selection may be less ephemeral, in the present than under more ‘natural’ conditions prevailing in the past.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

BUFFERED EFFECT. “Although the global scale of environment change caused by human disturbance is largely unprecedented in evolutionary history, the magnitude of the resulting genetic change does not seem abnormally high.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

REVERSIBLE AND EPHEMERAL. “If contemporary evolution is often reversible and rarely accumulates into long-term changes, how do larger changes in taxa ultimately arise?” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

MACROEVOLUTION. “Darwin's finches, which show such dramatic change on short time-scales, continue to appear much as they did millions of years ago. Macroevolution may thus require progressive change in the environment that takes evolution consistently in one direction (such as increased body size). It is important to note, however, that this may sometimes be a gradual process, interspersed with many temporary reversals of direction.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

SPECTRUM. “Recognition of the rate and ecological significance of adaptive evolution is heralding a new epoch where the dichotomy between ecological and evolutionary time and, more importantly, between ecological and evolutionary processes is breaking down.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

ECOLOGICAL IMPACT. “Using comprehensive and long-term data for Darwin's finches and freshwater copepods, they conclude that population growth rate can sometimes be at least twice as sensitive to evolutionary changes as to important ecological changes in abiotic factors, such as rainfall. In other words, evolutionary change can have substantial effects on ecological dynamics.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

“PHENOTYPIC PLASTICITY results from the developmental and behavioral responses of genotypes to environmental influences, and operates both within and across generations.” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn

MULTIPLE EFFECTS. “Plasticity may have a variety of influences on contemporary evolution, ranging from being a constraint on adaptive evolution (owing to reduced selection) all the way to being a promoter of adaptive evolution (by bringing populations into the domain of attraction of new fitness peaks).” https://lnkd.in/dAmAVYa View in LinkedIn