“The origin of life on Earth is a scientific problem,” according to WIKIPEDIA, “which is not yet solved. There are many ideas but few clear facts.” To address this issue, in 2013, Princeton University hosted an international origin of life conference.
In the nineteenth century, the “spontaneous generation” theory had long been the natural explanation for the origin of life, starting in Greek philosophy. Even Charles Darwin, centuries later, in The Origin of Species (1859), endorsed the theory.
Scientists last week proposed new evolutionary relationships among all 9,993 of the world’s known living bird species. In a letter published in the prestigious Nature journal, scientists reported on the use of DNA-sequence data to create a radiating phylogenetic tree, a revolutionary new bird tree of life (pictured left).
Walter Jetz (pictured right), an evolutionary biologist at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, was the leading author of the letter entitled “The global diversity of birds in space and time.” In an interview with science writer Virginia Gewin for Nature News, Jetz explains –
“This is the first dated tree of life for a class of species this size to be put on a global map.”
Exploring human evolution via DNA was essential for twentieth-century evolution scientists. Charles Darwin, however, in The Origin of Species, never used the terms genetics, genetic, and genes until 1872, following the publication of the pea plantinheritance report of Gregor Mendel in 1866.
In his sixth edition, Darwin used the term “genetic” twice, but only to express a genealogical idea, not as a molecular term. In the words of American evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin,
Deciphering evidence for sea star evolution has long intrigued biologists. To explore speciation between two similar-looking sea stars, Jonathan Puritz (pictured below) of the Institute of Marine Biology at The University of Hawaii coordinated a research team to correlate the genetic and geographic differences between two Coral Seaspecies.
The team’s report, entitled “Extraordinarily rapid life-history divergence between Cryptasterina sea star species,” was published last week in the Proceedings of the Royal Society.
The “Insights into hominid evolution from the gorilla genome sequence” report, published by the British journal Nature this last week, stands as a historical milestone in the study of human origins, sequencing the gorilla genome.
Aylwyn Scally (pictured right below) at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute led the research team to complete the gorilla genome sequence project, the last genus of the living great apes to have its genome decoded.
Darwin, Then and Now, the Most Amazing Story in the History of Science, is a chronicle of who Darwin was, how he developed his theory, specifically what he said, and what scientists have discovered since the publication of The Origin of Species in 1859.
The book traces the rise and fall of evolution's popularity as a scientifically valid theory. With over 1,000 references from Darwin and scientists, Darwin Then and Now retraces developments in the most amazing story in the history of science. DarwinThenandNow.com focuses on understanding the intersection of biological evolution and science.
“The origin of life on Earth is a scientific problem,” according to WIKIPEDIA, “which is not yet solved. There are many ideas but few clear facts.” To address this issue, in 2013, Princeton University hosted an international origin of life conference.
Scientists last week proposed new evolutionary relationships among all 9,993 of the world’s known living bird 
Exploring human evolution via DNA was essential for twentieth-century evolution scientists. 
Deciphering evidence for sea star evolution has long intrigued biologists. To explore speciation between two similar-looking sea stars, 
The “Insights into hominid evolution from the gorilla genome sequence” 