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Biology of Floral Scent
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Plant-Pollinator Interactions: From Specialization to Generalization
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Insect-Plant Biology
ASIN: 0849322839 |
Book Description
As with nearly all living creatures, humans have always been attracted and intrigued by floral scents. Yet, while we have been manufacturing perfumes for at least 5000 years to serve a myriad of religious, sexual, and medicinal purposes, until very recently, the limitation of our olfactory faculty has greatly hindered our capacity to clearly and objectively measure scent. Today, thanks to advances in practical methodologies and affordable instrumentation, we are now able to collect, separate, and identify volatile compounds with aromatic impact. These advances are leading to much intensive investigation that has already resulted in many highly insightful and useful discoveries. Biology of Floral Scent provides the first comprehensive treatment of the biology of floral scents. It reviews the impressive research being done across several disciplines, incorporating molecular biology, enzymology, chemistry, entomology, genetic engineering, and functional genomics. Organized into a single volume for the first time, this landmark work covers every major aspect of floral scent research including- · Function and significance in the interactions between plants and pollinators · Composition and enzymology · Evolutionary aspects · Commercial applications, including the use of recently identified scent genes to genetically engineer flowers to produce new scents Meeting the needs of plant scientists, cell and molecular biologists, natural product chemists, pharmacognosists, and entomologists, as well as students in these fields, this work provides the background, findings, and insight that will stimulate new research to further advance an understanding of floral scent biology.
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How do species evolve? Richard Dawkins, one of the world's most eminent zoologists, likens the process to scaling a huge, Himalaya-size peak, the Mount Improbable of his title. An alpinist does not leap from sea level to the summit; neither does a species utterly change forms overnight, but instead follows a course of "slow, cumulative, one-step-at-a-time, non-random survival of random variants"--a course that Charles Darwin, Dawkins's great hero, called natural selection. Illustrating his arguments with case studies from the natural world, such as the evolution of the eye and the lung, and the coevolution of certain kinds of figs and wasps, Dawkins provides a vigorous, entertaining defense of key Darwinian ideas.
Book Description
A brilliant book celebrating improbability as the engine that drives life, by the acclaimed author of The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker. The human eye is so complex and works so precisely that surely, one might believe, its current shape and function must be the product of design. How could such an intricate object have come about by chance? Tackling this subject--in writing that the New York Times called "a masterpiece"--Richard Dawkins builds a carefully reasoned and lovingly illustrated argument for evolutionary adaptation as the mechanism for life on earth. The metaphor of Mount Improbable represents the combination of perfection and improbability that is epitomized in the seemingly "designed" complexity of living things. Dawkins skillfully guides the reader on a breathtaking journey through the mountain's passes and up its many peaks to demonstrate that following the improbable path to perfection takes time. Evocative illustrations accompany Dawkins's eloquent descriptions of extraordinary adaptations such as the teeming populations of figs, the intricate silken world of spiders, and the evolution of wings on the bodies of flightless animals. And through it all runs the thread of DNA, the molecule of life, responsible for its own destiny on an unending pilgrimage through time. Climbing Mount Improbable is a book of great impact and skill, written by the most prominent Darwinian of our age.
Customer Reviews:
Dawkins' Plethora of Illustrated Examples of Gradual Evolution via Natural Selection.......2007-09-25
Climbing Mount Improbable is an expanded transcript of Dawkins' Growing Up in the Universe, first broadcast in 1991 in five episodes, which was filmed during a series of Royal Institution Christmas Lectures (which have been held in London annually since 1825 first started by Michael Faraday). For those who have seen the series, Climbing Mount Improbable is that whole series plus five years worth of updates (this book was first published in 1996). For those who haven't seen the series, its worth getting because the series compliments this book wonderfully.
Climbing Mount Improbable is a collection of examples of gradual evolution via natural selection with a good load of illustrations and photographs to back it up. In terms of value for money this book is essentially a pinnacle in Dawkins' thoughts on evolutionary biology with the evidence to back it up and so for that reason really does offer a lot more than most books for the price.
Nobody does it better than Dawkins when it comes to presenting biology lessons of a lifetime. The fact that this book is based on the materials for a set of Royal Institution Christmas Lectures says it all about the quality of the information in the pages. If there is a biology book you are going to get then get this at all costs. It's both the foundation and the finishing touch on assembling the facts surrounding living things.
Dawkins covers ten chosen topics. Each topic is about evolutionary biology. The main theme of the book is about the illusion of intelligent design and how natural selection is the right approach to understanding the gradual development of complex organisms from simpler ones. The metaphor of the mountain with many peaks is used throughout the book to describe the process of evolution via natural selection. This mountain is what Dawkins calls Mount Improbable.
Chapter 1 "Facing Mount Rushmore"
This chapter deals with illusions in natural design such as seeing John F. Kennedy in a mountain face and comparisons to actual intelligent designs such as Mount Rushmore. Dawkins then examines mimicry in insects such as ants mimicking beetles and beetles mimicking termites, all explained by natural selection. Dawkins covers several designoid objects such as the pitcher plant and pots made by potter wasps and mason bees. Convergent evolution describes how specific environmental conditions can produce the same evolved characteristics in separate species. Millipedes copulate face to face. The wild cabbage has bred an amazing diversity of cabbage-like plants. The Chihuahua has eventually been bred from the wolf. Dawkins famous blind watchmaker program is then shown to produce a variety of computer generated biomorphs to illustrate how complex organisms form through heredity via natural selection.
Chapter 2 "Silken Fetters"
Dawkins describes in deep detail the evolution of the spider-web before going on to explain adaptive variations and in the web design.
Chapter 3 "The Message From the Mountain"
Dawkins gives a general rundown on how natural selection gradually works including mutation and the error of calling evolution chance. Dawkins gives examples including the evolution of the elephant trunk and the giraffe neck. The topics of macro-mutations and punctuated evolution are covered.
Chapter 4 "Getting Off the Ground"
Dawkins describes the evolution of flight. Magnitude and volume in relation to evolutionary constraints under the laws of physics is extremely interesting. Creatures that glide are illustrated. Dawkins answers why mammals are found in the sea if mammals evolved from fish and then proceeds to give examples of fish that have strange adaptations via natural selection such as the flat-fish.
Chapter 5 "The Forty-fold Path to Enlightenment"
Dawkins describes the evolution of the eye in vast detail. The evolution of the eye is often called impossible by some yet the solution is again found in the gradual process of natural selection. Dawkins then goes on to show how the eye has independently evolved in other species.
Chapter 6 "The Museum of All Shells"
Using just three mathematical variables of the flare, verm and spire Dawkins systematically develops complex shells. Then by adding another dimension of size and change of each possible variable Dawkins surprises the reader with an array of every complex form of life on the planet today. This is a real eye-opener... and an evolved eye at that.
Chapter 7 "Kaleidoscopic Embryos"
If you have ever wondered how those amazing jellyfish look so mechanical Dawkins explains it using the idea of kaleidoscopes and natural selection. This chapter then leads up to another surprise of how body parts evolve into their complexities from less complex designs. This is yet another brain raiser... and an evolved brain at that too.
Chapter 8 "Pollen Grains and Magic Bullets"
Dawkins illustrates and describes the symbiotic relationships between flowers and the insects they need to reproduce them, all developed via natural selection.
Chapter 9 "The Robot Repeater"
All living things are in fact hosts for DNA. DNA for wings is there so that wings can help DNA spread. DNA says copy me to copy me. That's it! This is the meaning of life in a nutshell. Shockingly simple but this is what has been at the heart of all biological questions since humans first asked "why we are the way we are?" using our emergent consciousness.
Chapter 10 "A Garden Inclosed"
Dawkins does the evolution of the fig via natural selection in a way that only very patient readers or professional biologists will appreciate. It's the book's example of tour-de-force natural selection. It is highly complex and requires several readings to even begin to comprehend it.
This book is a world beyond the question of whether evolution is real or not. Not only is this book dealing with the fact of evolution but its business is with the mechanisms of natural selection in all its forms as a real process that is observable, testable and verifiable. For people who are still unsure about evolution this book will not only convince but does so by going into the deep end and presenting what biologists know about this certainty of life.
The style of critical thinking is also something to learn outside of the book's topic. Dawkins writes likes it is the reader who is doing all the work, and they are if they can think through every step of his mountain climb. You will never see life the same way again. Everything, and I mean everything, you see will be subject to analysis. Dawkins has set his standards as high as Everest. You will stand at the summit with a refined critical mind and that is guaranteed.
Not the Best Dawkins Book.......2006-05-23
Although I called this "Not the best Dawkins Book," notice I still gave it four stars. If you're looking for a dispute against creationism as I know a lot of Dawkins' readers are, then I'd recommend The Blind Watchmaker instead. However, if you're looking for a few interesting examples of the beauty of natural selection at work, Dawkins articulates them well in this book touching on: elephant trunks, spider webs, wasps & figs, the eye, flying things, and some molluscs.
There is current empirical evidence for evolution and speciation.......2006-04-17
I know this forum is supposed to be about the book, but I am so tired of people in the evolution vs. no-evolution debate claiming there is NO EVIDENCE (it's always in caps) for evolution. Can any of these people honestly claim they've done the research to support their claims? How many hours have they logged in research libraries? How many footnotes and bibliographies have they gone through and followed up on? I'm not saying there aren't issues with evolutionary theory and possible lines of argument. But the age-old "there isn't any direct evidence" simply is not true and it does a disservice to the debate to keep saying that. Here are just a FEW examples I've come across with minimal research:
First, the Grant's have done a 20 year, exhaustive, fasicinating study of the CURRENT evolution of the Galapogos finches. They have recorded measurable changes in morphology and behavior due to natural selection. It is not philosophy, it is not conjecture, it is in the data. Gigabytes of it.
Two, ACTUAL SPECIATION has been observed and studied in at least one species of fruit fly.
Microbiologists and pathologists (and anyone fighting disease today) can show you numerous example of evolution in action. MEASURABLE, QUANTIFIABLE evolution. Even if they didn't (and they did) does anyone out there think that antibiotics are becoming less effective because of intelligent design?
Several species of guppy's have been used to perform REPEATABLE, MEASURABLE expirements that demonstrate natural selection in action. This is a "real" experiment in a real lab, as if that's the only kind of science that means something; but still, if that's what people are complaining doesn't exist, they are wrong.
There is a journal devoted to covering evolution in action and the scientists that are observing it in nature and running experiments in the lab. You can read countless more stories (one of my favorite is the frog taking over Australia after 80 years of harmless-ness due to a favorable mutation).
The papers are all out there. The data is there. You just have to look (and be willing to look). And this is stuff I've come across as just a casual reader with an interest in evolution. I actually started out believing the DARWIN WAS IN CRISIS! Oh heavens! I read that there is was no evidence of evolution so maybe it evolution is just an unprovable theory (= philosophy). I actually believed that. But then I took the step that so many don't: I actually did some research - and it didn't take much. What a crazy idea.
So please, please stop saying there is no evidence until you have done the hard work of the research yourself and stop repeating cliche's from people with an agenda.
Dawkins gets better with age........2006-03-27
Ricard Dawkins did a fine job with "The Blind Watchmaker", but "Climbing Mt. Improbable" is at least two notches better. With and additioal decade of scientific discovery since his earlier books, Dawkins has really put Intelligent Design in his cross hairs and laid out the facts. What one chooses to do with the new insights into evolution is a personal choice.
A reducionist's view of evolution.......2005-08-29
This book is interesting and does a really good job defending Darwinism, even though it is way too long on some topics, becoming boring, like the excessively long chapter about spider webs.
The author, however, is what others call a reducionist, treating only isolated aspects of living beings and completely avoiding much more complex and philosophic topics, like how some species aquired conscience and self-awareness (which of course is totally different from simply being able to process information in the brain). Dawkins loves to use computer simulation for proving some of his arguments. He probably would concur that computers will never be conscious or self-aware, but he does not even try to explain how random mutations could give matter such capabilities.
Dawkins is also proud of his Darwinist beliefs and makes fun of people who think otherwise. However, if he takes his own arguments literally, he would have to admit that any thoughts that happen in his or anybody else's brains are nothing more than ripples of the big-bang anyway.
Book Description
The field of evolutionary biology arose from the desire to understand the origin and diversity of biological forms. In recent years, however, evolutionary genetics, with its focus on the modification and inheritance of presumed genetic programs, has all but overwhelmed other aspects of evolutionary biology. This has led to the neglect of the study of the generative origins of biological form.
Drawing on work from developmental biology, paleontology, developmental and population genetics, cancer research, physics, and theoretical biology, this book explores the multiple factors responsible for the origination of biological form. It examines the essential problems of morphological evolution--why, for example, the basic body plans of nearly all metazoans arose within a relatively short time span, why similar morphological design motifs appear in phylogenetically independent lineages, and how new structural elements are added to the body plan of a given phylogenetic lineage. It also examines discordances between genetic and phenotypic change, the physical determinants of morphogenesis, and the role of epigenetic processes in evolution. The book discusses these and other topics within the framework of evolutionary developmental biology, a new research agenda that concerns the interaction of development and evolution in the generation of biological form. By placing epigenetic processes, rather than gene sequence and gene expression changes, at the center of morphological origination, this book points the way to a more comprehensive theory of evolution.
Customer Reviews:
Documents the major problems with neo-Darwinism.......2004-03-24
Origination of Organismal Form: Beyond The Gene In Developmental And Evolutionary Biology is a collection of excellent essays by scientists who assume Darwinian evolution, but whose work reveals various major evidential and conceptual problems with the theory. They are part of a growing number of scientists who find major problems with Darwinism but are not any type of creationist. The problems with Darwinism are usually buried deep in technical publications but they are there if one looks. Anyone with the training and inclination to read this book could benefit greatly from it. I strongly recommend it to anyone interested in evolutionary biology. We can no longer ignore these problems. They are too great and must be dealt with. This book is an excellent introduction to these problems. A must read book!!!
In Search of a Theory of Evolution.......2003-02-10
The public Darwin debate doesn't really match the progress of biological research. And experts in the field seem reticent to point to the limits of the standard theories. Here we are told plainly, Darwinism has no theory of the generative. And the breakthroughs in developmental genetics fail to explicate the sources of organismic form. The text acknowledges that concern with the gene has overshadowed all other aspects of the discussion.
This highly interesting, not too technical, work explores the work being done on evolutionary innovation. A theory of evolution should explicate both innovation and diversification.But natural selection can only explain how what already exists is maintained or transformed in the process of ecological survival. The standard explanations of variation and natural selection do not really explain this '
source of form' aspect of evolution, and we are presented with ambiguous statements about an evolutionary toolkit, in the developmental version, whose origins could not spring from the processes described in the Neo-Darwinian Synthesis. It seems an advance that a technical work by experts in the field would point this out. This is a very useful glimpse of the real work needed in biology, and should prove a useful refuge from the confusing public discourse on evolution that is generally less than helpful.
Book Description
While neo-Darwinism has considerable explanatory power, it is widely recognized as lacking a component dealing with individual development, or ontogeny. This lack is particularly conspicuous when attempting to explain the evolutionary origin of the thirty-five or so animal body plans, and of the developmental trajectories that generate them. This significant work examines both the origin of body plans in particular and the evolution of animal development in general. Wallace Arthur ranges widely in his treatment, covering topics as diverse as comparative developmental genetics, selection theory, and Vendian/Cambrian fossils. He places particular emphasis on gene duplication, changes in spatio-temporal gene-expression patterns, internal selection, coevolution of interacting genes, and coadaptation. The book will be of particular interest to students and researchers in evolutionary biology, genetics, paleontology, and developmental biology.
Customer Reviews:
Different evolutionary contexts when body plans originated.......2005-07-02
Let's see, my take on the book in a nutshell: the conditions under which evolution operated during the Cambrian/Vendian times were different from the conditions following that time in two main ways, and these differences can potentially account for the origin of the many animal body plans during those early periods and the lack of new ones since.
First, ~550 million years ago most animals were very much simpler (fewer cells, for example) than they are today, so changes to their developmental programs would have been better tolerated. The more complex any system is (the more parts it has, the more coordinated and well-matched those parts must be, etc.), the more rigidly constrained and less amenable to a given magnitude of change it is. So the simpler developmental processes (simpler adult-form end product, fewer interactions between developmental genes, etc.) of early animals would have allowed for a 'large-scale' change to be incorporated into that animal's ontogeny, though if a change of the same magnitude were to occur today, it would be too disruptive to the complex developmental program and would be eliminated (note that 'large-scale change' refers to the adult form: the actual change that caused that altered end result could be a typical small scale mutation, in an early developmental stage). The author is not proposing Goldschmidt's "hopeful monsters" that occur due to 'macromutations', but rather an intermediate position between that and the "only micromutations" view of gradualistic neo-Darwinism. And, as just mentioned, mutations in developmental processes (even ones that resulted in 'macromutations' in the adult form) would have been more tolerated in the simpler animals that existed ~550 mya than they would be in today's.
Second, ~550 million years ago animal diversity was extremely more limited than it is today, so there was a huge number of open niches: a plentitude the likes of which has never again existed on our planet. An organism that happened to find itself in one of the multitude of open niches (by means of a "semi-macro" mutation, the product of a change in a developmental gene) would have faced little if any competition. The reduced external competition would potentially allow the morpholigical variation(s), that would otherwise likely have been eliminated, to persist. (The sudden change could leave the organism with a lower level of internal coordination: over time, internal cooadaptation could evolve to 'catch up' with the change in morphology: these internal adjustments would leave no trace in the fossil record).
Combining these two ideas produces a reasonable explanation of the 'explosion' in new body plans in Vendian/Cambrian times.
Of course there's much more to the book than my above "nutshell" presentation. The Evo-Devo perspective presented in the book allowed me to view evolution in a new way: it gave me a better understanding of the "creative" side of evolution than I had before when viewing things solely from a gradualistic, neo-Darwinian frame of reference.
PS: The book is "aged" (1997) but is not outdated.
Body plans, hox genes, and developmental biology.......2000-12-19
This work is a technical introduction to evolutionary developmental biology and introduces a very different perspective on evolution from what one is used to in the usual biology texts. In spite of its moderate difficulty, to a non-specialist, it is actually much clearer than simplified versions of Darwinism, and one can recommend it strongly as a perspective on the separate current to the Neo-Darwinian synthesis that has flowed from its nineteenth century origins parallel to Darwin. In the age of the Genome this dark side of the moon as to theoretical paradigms is coming into full view. The book starts with an exhortation to the reader "to believe that current evolutionary theory based on natural selection and adaptation in natural lineages is, at the very least, incomplete..." The author asks, did "evolution really have an early 'morphogenetic' phase during which most major body plans originated?" The difficulty of explaining the fact that no phylum-level body plans have arisen in the last 500 my becomes one of the starting points of the book. In general this perspective asks for the creative aspect of development beyond the destructive aspect of natural selection models. From there the book proceeds to the issues of cladism, body plans, genetic regulation, and many other topics in a comprehensive presentation. The crucial significance of all this for understanding evolution and extricating oneself from disinformation in the Darwin debate are obvious. Much of the boilerplate and blah-blah of the public discourse on evolution can be left behind in a fast getaway into some better fare than the current offerings. We are beginning to catch a glimpse of a new world of evolution, one that has been with us all along in embryo, as forseen by such biologists as Soren Lovtrup in Darwinism: Refutation of a Myth. That day is now arriving.
Book Description
A departure from mainstream biology, the idea of symbiosis - as in the genetic and metabolic interactions of the bacterial communities that became the earliest eukaryotes and eventually evolved into plants and animals - has attracted the attention of a growing number of scientists.
These original contributions by symbiosis biologists and evolutionary theorists address the adequacy of the prevailing neo-Darwinian concept of evolution in the light of growing evidence that hereditary symbiosis, supplemented by the gradual accumulation of heritable mutation, results in the origin of new species and morphological novelty. They include reports of current research on the evolutionary consequences of symbiosis, the protracted physical association between organisms of different species. Among the issues considered are individuality and evolution, microbial symbioses, animalbacterial symbioses, and the importance of symbiosis in cell evolution, ecology, and morphogenesis.
Lynn Margulis, Distinguished Professor of Botany at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is the modern originator of the symbiotic theory of cell evolution. Once considered heresy, her ideas are now part of the microbiological revolution. René Fester is a graduate student in the biological sciences at Northern Arizona University.
Contributors: Peter Atsatt. Richard C. Back. David Bermudes. Paola Bonfante-Fasolo. René Fester. Lynda J. Goff. Anne-Marie Grenier. Ricardo Guerrero. Robert H. Haynes. Rosmarie Honegger. Gregory Hinkle. Kwang W. Jeon. Bryce Kendrick. Richard Law. David Lewis. Lynn Margulis. John Maynard Smith. Margaret J. McFall-Ngai. Paul Nardon. Kenneth H. Nealson. Kris Pirozynski. Peter W. Price. Mary Beth Saffo. Jan Sapp. Silvano Scannerini. Werner Schwemmler. Sorin Sonea. Toomas H. Tiivel. Robert K. Trench. Russell Vetter.
Book Description
This book examines the genetic circuitry of the well-known "fruit fly," tackling questions of cell assemblage and pattern formation, of the hows and the whys behind the development of the fly. After an initial examination of the proximity versus pedigree imperatives, the volume delves into bristle pattern formation and disc development, with entire chapters devoted to the leg, wing, and eye. Extensive appendices include a glossary of protein domains, catalogs of well-studied genes, and an outline of signaling pathways. More than 30 wiring diagrams among over 60 detailed schematics clarify the text.
Book Description
-- E. Gittenberger, National Museum of Natural History, Leiden, The Netherlands, Koninklijke Brill (Crustaceana)
Theoretical morphology--which seeks to sketch the range of forms that biological entities could take, with the ultimate goal of discovering why certain forms exist but others do not--is among paleontology's most significant contributions to the understanding of evolution. Today, with the aid of computers in developing conceivable morphologies, the discipline has been able to advance into a remarkable tool for the study of evolution. Yet despite these advances, the field remains largely untapped and ripe with research potential. In this volume, paleontologist George McGhee presents the first complete overview of the field, its advancements in recent years, and the challenges ahead.
Theoretical Morphology provides readers with the background they need to launch their own research. McGhee describes the steps involved in defining the geometric parameters (theoretical morphospaces) for an organic form in order to generate a spectrum of other possible forms that have never actually appeared. He also addresses the simulation of actual processes of morphogenesis, with the goal of attaining a more nuanced comprehension of how evolutionary processes work.
Theoretical Morphology takes readers through a variety of theoretical morphospaces including those for univalved, bivalved, discrete, and branching growth systems. With a glossary of terms and a comprehensive list of references on the subject, this is an excellent handbook for graduate students or professional scientists interested in employing these cutting-edge techniques in their own research.
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Form and Function of Insect Wings: The Evolution of Biological Structures
Dmitry L. Grodnitsky
Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
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ASIN: 0801860032 |
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"Insect flight," writes Dmitry Grodnitsky, "is the most diverse kind of animal aerial locomotion." In Form and Function of Insect Wings Grodnitsky offers a comprehensive overview of the functional morphology of insect wings from the viewpoint of general biology and uses these data to help further explain animal morphology.
Grodnitsky evaluates functional issues relating to insect diversification, particularly wing structure and kinematics. He discusses recent data on wing kinematics and structure from the point of view of modern insect flight aerodynamics and general evolutionary morphology. He is most concerned with the question of which features of an organism can be explained by natural selection of given functional variants and which cannot.
Chapter topics include general information on insect flight, vortex aerodynamics, the diversity and evolution of flapping flight, wing morphology, and general evolutionary considerations. Form and Function of Insect Wings will be of interest to evolutionary biologists worldwide, particularly those concerned with morphological questions, and entomologists, especially those interested in how insect wings work. The book also contains a novel insect taxonomy at supraordinal level (by Alexandr P. Rasnitsyn) and throws light on recent developments in contemporary Russian evolutionary theory.
"[Insect wings are] almost uniquely convenient objects for a survey of comparative morphology. The broad diversification of wing shapes and their constructions within insect class provide fruitful soil for analyses and reconstructions of historical trends... In insects, flight probably involves more diverse mechanisms than in any other animal taxon. Although disagreement remains on the way insects manage to stay aloft, certain regularities can clearly be described, thus explaining particular trends in insect evolution." -- from the Preface
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- Valuable Contribution
- "Fresh Look"
- Goes Above and Beyond
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Beyond Heterochrony: The Evolution of Development
Manufacturer: Wiley-Liss
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0471379735 |
Book Description
The ten chapters in Beyond Heterochrony: The Evolution of Development explore the evolution of biological development from many different perspectives. They present their research and consider all sides of the often controversial concept of heterochrony without intellectual limits.
In looking beyond heterochrony, this book attends to a variety of explanations for evolutionary development. The chapters present theoretical and practical approaches with real data, using examples from both extant and extinct forms of animal and plant life to present refreshing and at times divergent perspectives on the subject.
Each chapter offers a substantive and original contribution to the literature, with case studies that explore the developmental basis of morphological evolution in a unique way. They address a number of issues and provide real data on which their conclusions rest, as well as the phylogenetic context of evolutionary interpretations.
The book includes thorough analysis of the ontogeny and phylogeny of shape-for decades the very heart of studies of heterochrony-and also presents novel approaches with new hypotheses. The hypotheses considered are as diverse as their analytical methodologies: each goes beyond heterochrony in a different way and in so doing, steers the discussion of the evolution of development in fascinating new directions.
Customer Reviews:
Valuable Contribution.......2003-02-01
"...a valuable contribution because of its wide compass and unfamiliar examples..." (British Society for Developmental Biology)
"Fresh Look".......2001-11-01
"Patterns of covariation permeate the study of evolution and development. This book provides a badly needed fresh look at these patterns, and does so in a reasonable and balanced way. It critiques the excessive simplicities of past approaches (such as that all developmental evolution is heterochrony) and provides constructive suggestions for improving them." --Michael L. McKinney, Director, Environmental Studies Program and Professor of Geological Sciences and Ecology/Evolutionary Biology, University of Tennessee
Goes Above and Beyond.......2001-11-01
"The book certainly lives up to its title: it not only provides new data and analyses for classical and novel examples of heterochrony, but also suggests alternative interpretations or ways to describe evolutionary changes. The strongest point of the book is the serious attempt made by most of the authors to incorporate an explicit phylogenetic analysis." --David H. A. Fitch, New York University
Books:
- Biology, Sixth Edition
- Biology, Sixth Edition
- Biology, Sixth Edition
- Chemical Applications of Group Theory, 3rd Edition
- Chemical Principles: The Quest for Insight
- Chemical Principles: The Quest for Insight
- Chemistry and Chemical Reactivity (with General ChemistryNOW CD-ROM)
- Chemistry, Fourth Edition
- Chemistry Made Simple
- Chemistry: The Central Science, Ninth Edition
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- The House of the Scorpion
- The Great American Pin-Up
- The Joy of Chemistry: The Amazing Science of Familiar Things
- The New Woman of Color: The Collected Writings of Fannie Barrier Williams, 1893-1918
- Drawing Fire: A Combat Artist at War : Pacific Europe Korea Indochina Vietnam
- Simon & Schuster's Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of the World
- Revision of the Genus Batrachospermum Roth
