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Darwin’s Other Mistake Michael R. Rose and Theodore Garland, Jr.

This article explores Darwin's misconceptions about heredity mechanisms and the gradual nature of evolution. It emphasizes the importance of experimental studies in evolutionary biology and highlights the major approaches to analyzing evolutionary processes.

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Darwin’s Other Mistake Michael R. Rose and Theodore Garland, Jr.

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  1. Darwin’s Other MistakeMichael R. Rose and Theodore Garland, Jr.

  2. Darwin’s 1st Mistake • Mechanism of heredity wrong • Thought “ an arbitrary number of ductile transmissible gemmules” moved from organs to gonads • Gemmules allowed blending along with inheriting acquired characters

  3. Darwin’s 2nd Mistake • Evolution is gradual and occurs so slowly that it cannot be observed • 1896 Illinois Corn Experiment selected for oil content showed observable evolution • Many more studies followed that showed natural selection can be observed • But most people still believe natural selection happens very slowly and is difficult to observe Charles Lyell

  4. Experimental Evolution • Definition: “Research in which populations are studied across multiple generations under defined and reproducible conditions, whether in the laboratory or in nature.” • The key to keep biology as a fully scientific field. • More closely resembles physics that most research in biology. • Emphasizes hypothesis testing, trajectories, replication and reproducibility.

  5. Macroevolution vs Microevolution • Micro – evolution within populations • Macro – change at or above the level of the species • Speciation is on the fuzzy boundary of both. • Macro is difficult to observe because of the time involved but scientists use microevolutionary analyses to address hypotheses about macro.

  6. THE IMPORTANCE OF EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES IN EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGYDouglas J. Futuyma and Albert F. Bennett

  7. The major approaches to analyzing evolutionary processes: • Experimental Evolution • Studies of Natural Populations • Comparative methods

  8. Advantages- Replication and control. Disadvantages –suited to laboratory rather than to natural situations. Experimental Evolution

  9. Natural Populations • Advantage- offer ecological realism • Disadvantage - lack of ability to replicate results and control variables.

  10. Advantage- widely used method to understand evolution of characters in the natural world. Disadvantage- Correlational Assumption of parsimony Comparative Methods

  11. Trade-offs- adaptive gain and correlated loss. Escherichia Coli Genetic Drift – a founder event (or bottleneck in population size) may initiate new paths of adaptive evolution. Drosophila pseudoobscura 2 Examples of the Contribution of Experimental Studies to understand Evolution

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