Download or read book How Have Animals Evolved and Adapted written by Jennifer Swanson and published by The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. This book was released on 2015-07-15 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scientists believe that all forms of life developed from earlier types of living things through a process called evolution. In this intriguing and engaging narrative, readers learn that living organisms must adapt to survive as their surroundings change. By studying the developmental history of everything from single cell organisms to complex vertebrates, readers are presented with the evidence for evolution provided by the fossil record. Charles Darwin and the process of natural selection are discussed. In addition, the work of Gregor Mendel opens a window onto genetics and gets readers thinking about how genes work together to produce specific traits.
Download or read book Darwin Comes to Town written by Menno Schilthuizen and published by Picador. This book was released on 2018-04-03 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Carrion crows in the Japanese city of Sendai have learned to use passing traffic to crack nuts. *Lizards in Puerto Rico are evolving feet that better grip surfaces like concrete. *Europe’s urban blackbirds sing at a higher pitch than their rural cousins, to be heardover the din of traffic. How is this happening? Menno Schilthuizen is one of a growing number of “urban ecologists” studying how our manmade environments are accelerating and changing the evolution of the animals and plants around us. In Darwin Comes to Town, he takes us around the world for an up-close look at just how stunningly flexible and swift-moving natural selection can be. With human populations growing, we’re having an increasing impact on global ecosystems, and nowhere do these impacts overlap as much as they do in cities. The urban environment is about as extreme as it gets, and the wild animals and plants that live side-by-side with us need to adapt to a whole suite of challenging conditions: they must manage in the city’s hotter climate (the “urban heat island”); they need to be able to live either in the semidesert of the tall, rocky, and cavernous structures we call buildings or in the pocket-like oases of city parks (which pose their own dangers, including smog and free-rangingdogs and cats); traffic causes continuous noise, a mist of fine dust particles, and barriers to movement for any animal that cannot fly or burrow; food sources are mainly human-derived. And yet, as Schilthuizen shows, the wildlife sharing these spaces with us is not just surviving, but evolving ways of thriving. Darwin Comes toTown draws on eye-popping examples of adaptation to share a stunning vision of urban evolution in which humans and wildlife co-exist in a unique harmony. It reveals that evolution can happen far more rapidly than Darwin dreamed, while providing a glimmer of hope that our race toward over population might not take the rest of nature down with us.
Download or read book Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid written by Thor Hanson and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2021-09-28 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *A New York Times Editor's Choice pick *Shortlisted for the 2022 Pacific Northwest Book Awards A beloved natural historian explores how climate change is driving evolution In Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid, biologist Thor Hanson tells the remarkable story of how plants and animals are responding to climate change: adjusting, evolving, and sometimes dying out. Anole lizards have grown larger toe pads, to grip more tightly in frequent hurricanes. Warm waters cause the development of Humboldt squid to alter so dramatically that fishermen mistake them for different species. Brown pelicans move north, and long-spined sea urchins south, to find cooler homes. And when coral reefs sicken, they leave no territory worth fighting for, so aggressive butterfly fish transform instantly into pacifists. A story of hope, resilience, and risk, Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid is natural history for readers of Bernd Heinrich, Robin Wall Kimmerer, and David Haskell. It is also a reminder of how unpredictable climate change is as it interacts with the messy lattice of life.
Download or read book How Have Animals Evolved and Adapted written by Jennifer A. Swanson and published by Encyclopaedia Britannica. This book was released on 2015-07-15 with total page 35 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, readers learn that living organisms must adapt to survive as their surroundings change. By studying the developmental history of everything from single cell organisms to complex vertebrates, readers are presented with the evidence for evolution provided by the fossil record.
Download or read book The Galapagos Islands written by Charles Darwin and published by Penguin Group. This book was released on 1996 with total page 68 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Animal Evolution and Adaptation written by Doug Bradley and published by . This book was released on 2023 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In this intriguing and engaging narrative, readers learn that living organisms must adapt to survive as their surroundings change. Scientists believe that all forms of life developed from earlier types of living things through a process called evolution. By studying the developmental history of everything from single cell organisms to complex vertebrates, readers are presented with the evidence for evolution provided by the fossil record. Charles Darwin and the process of natural selection are discussed. In addition, the work of Gregor Mendel opens a window onto genetics and gets readers thinking about how genes work together to produce specific traits"--
Download or read book Evolved written by Lucas Riera and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2021-11-02 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Follow the story of evolution! The illustrated children’s book is a beautiful introduction to the evolution of species over millions of years. What’s made animals survive and naturally go extinct? Why are fish scaled? Why do birds have wings? Find out about the changing animal anatomy discoveries made by Swedish zoologist Charles Linneas. Animals and evolution are fascinating subjects to teach little minds. Discover the ways that animals have adapted to survive and the amazing reasons behind these adaptations. The illustrated guide includes: • Beautiful artwork, perfect for fans of Owen Davey. • Many different animal features (like eyes, scales, claws, hair and many more), as well as feature spreads on topics like fast evolution. • Highly accessible text about a key school subject. Kids age 7 and older will be delighted by the scientific facts in this wildlife book. It’s filled with incredible bits of information that spark a deep curiosity in the natural world, evolution and the animal kingdom. The book highlights that evolution is an ongoing process, and allows kids to look at the world around them and notice the continuing evolution of species. Evolved also features more in-depth explanations of animal body parts, how they work and how they’re different from other species. Children will understand how evolution made certain elements of the natural world unnecessary, and others integral to survival. Explanations of Charles Linneas’ classification system of all living things are included and give kids, adults and educators a fantastic reference to the magnificent living world.
Download or read book Adaptation and Natural Selection written by George Christopher Williams and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2018-10-30 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Biological evolution is a fact—but the many conflicting theories of evolution remain controversial even today. When Adaptation and Natural Selection was first published in 1966, it struck a powerful blow against those who argued for the concept of group selection—the idea that evolution acts to select entire species rather than individuals. Williams’s famous work in favor of simple Darwinism over group selection has become a classic of science literature, valued for its thorough and convincing argument and its relevance to many fields outside of biology. Now with a new foreword by Richard Dawkins, Adaptation and Natural Selection is an essential text for understanding the nature of scientific debate.
Download or read book Understanding Climate s Influence on Human Evolution written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2010-04-17 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The hominin fossil record documents a history of critical evolutionary events that have ultimately shaped and defined what it means to be human, including the origins of bipedalism; the emergence of our genus Homo; the first use of stone tools; increases in brain size; and the emergence of Homo sapiens, tools, and culture. The Earth's geological record suggests that some evolutionary events were coincident with substantial changes in African and Eurasian climate, raising the possibility that critical junctures in human evolution and behavioral development may have been affected by the environmental characteristics of the areas where hominins evolved. Understanding Climate's Change on Human Evolution explores the opportunities of using scientific research to improve our understanding of how climate may have helped shape our species. Improved climate records for specific regions will be required before it is possible to evaluate how critical resources for hominins, especially water and vegetation, would have been distributed on the landscape during key intervals of hominin history. Existing records contain substantial temporal gaps. The book's initiatives are presented in two major research themes: first, determining the impacts of climate change and climate variability on human evolution and dispersal; and second, integrating climate modeling, environmental records, and biotic responses. Understanding Climate's Change on Human Evolution suggests a new scientific program for international climate and human evolution studies that involve an exploration initiative to locate new fossil sites and to broaden the geographic and temporal sampling of the fossil and archeological record; a comprehensive and integrative scientific drilling program in lakes, lake bed outcrops, and ocean basins surrounding the regions where hominins evolved and a major investment in climate modeling experiments for key time intervals and regions that are critical to understanding human evolution.
Download or read book Evolution of Island Mammals written by Alexandra van der Geer and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-02-14 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evolution on islands differs in a number of important ways from evolution on mainland areas. Over millions of years of isolation, exceptional and sometimes bizarre mammals evolved on islands, such as pig-sized elephants and hippos, giant rats and gorilla-sized lemurs that would have been formidable to their mainland ancestors. This timely and innovative book is the first to offer a much-needed synthesis of recent advances in the exciting field of the evolution and extinction of fossil insular placental mammals. It provides a comprehensive overview of current knowledge on fossil island mammals worldwide, ranging from the Oligocene to the onset of the Holocene. The book addresses evolutionary processes and key aspects of insular mammal biology, exemplified by a variety of fossil species. The authors discuss the human factor in past extinction events and loss of insular biodiversity. This accessible and richly illustrated textbook is written for graduate level students and professional researchers in evolutionary biology, palaeontology, biogeography, zoology, and ecology.
Download or read book Behaviour Development and Evolution written by Patrick Bateson and published by Open Book Publishers. This book was released on 2017-02-20 with total page 125 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The role of parents in shaping the characters of their children, the causes of violence and crime, and the roots of personal unhappiness are central to humanity. Like so many fundamental questions about human existence, these issues all relate to behavioural development. In this lucid and accessible book, eminent biologist Professor Sir Patrick Bateson suggests that the nature/nurture dichotomy we often use to think about questions of development in both humans and animals is misleading. Instead, he argues that we should pay attention to whole systems, rather than to simple causes, when trying to understand the complexity of development. In his wide-ranging approach Bateson discusses why so much behaviour appears to be well-designed. He explores issues such as ‘imprinting’ and its importance to the attachment of offspring to their parents; the mutual benefits that characterise communication between parent and offspring; the importance of play in learning how to choose and control the optimal conditions in which to thrive; and the vital function of adaptability in the interplay between development and evolution. Bateson disputes the idea that a simple link can be found between genetics and behaviour. What an individual human or animal does in its life depends on the reciprocal nature of its relationships with the world about it. This knowledge also points to ways in which an animal’s own behaviour can provide the variation that influences the subsequent course of evolution. This has relevance not only for our scientific approaches to the systems of development and evolution, but also on how humans change institutional rules that have become dysfunctional, or design public health measures when mismatches occur between themselves and their environments. It affects how we think about ourselves and our own capacity for change.
Download or read book Adaptation and Fitness in Animal Populations written by Julius van der Werf and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2008-10-17 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fitness and adaptation are fundamental characteristics of plant and animal species, enabling them to survive in their environment and to adapt to the inevitable changes in this environment. This is true for both the genetic resources of natural ecosystems as well as those used in agricultural production. Extensive genetic variation exists between varieties/breeds in a species and amongst individuals within breeds. This variation has developed over very long periods of time. A major ongoing challenge is how to best utilize this variation to meet short-term demands whilst also conserving it for longer-term possible use. Many animal breeding programs have led to increased performance for production traits but this has often been accompanied by reduced fitness. In addition, the global use of genetic resources prompts the question whether introduced genotypes are adapted to local production systems. Understanding the genetic nature of fitness and adaptation will enable us to better manage genetic resources allowing us to make efficient and sustainable decisions for the improvement or breeding of these resources. This book had an ambitious goal in bringing together a sample of the world’s leading scientists in animal breeding and evolutionary genetics to exchange knowledge to advance our understanding of these vital issues.
Download or read book Evolved written by and published by DK Children. This book was released on 2021-08-31 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An illustrated tribute to the evolution of species and all the incredible ways that animals have adapted to the world around them. How did fish get scales? Why do some animals have wings? What sea creature still has fingers hidden away in their fins? Journey through the animal kingdom, learning all about the different parts of animals that have evolved over the centuries, the ways that they have adapted to survive and the amazing reasons behind these adaptations. With different spreads on claws, feathers, eyes, hair, defenses and much more, readers will be able to compare the changes seen in different animals and see how incredible nature is at survival.
Download or read book Genetics of Adaptation written by Rodney Mauricio and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2005-07-20 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An enduring controversy in evolutionary biology is the genetic basis of adaptation. Darwin emphasized "many slight differences" as the ultimate source of variation to be acted upon by natural selection. In the early 1900’s, this view was opposed by "Mendelian geneticists", who emphasized the importance of "macromutations" in evolution. The Modern Synthesis resolved this controversy, concluding that mutations in genes of very small effect were responsible for adaptive evolution. A decade ago, Allen Orr and Jerry Coyne reexamined the evidence for this neo-Darwinian view and found that both the theoretical and empirical basis for it were weak. Orr and Coyne encouraged evolutionary biologists to reexamine this neglected question: what is the genetic basis of adaptive evolution? In this volume, a new generation of biologists have taken up this challenge. Using advances in both molecular genetic and statistical techniques, evolutionary geneticists have made considerable progress in this emerging field. In this volume, a diversity of examples from plant and animal studies provides valuable information for those interested in the genetics and evolution of complex traits.
Download or read book Opportunities in Biology written by National Research Council and published by National Academies. This book was released on 1989-01-01 with total page 471 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Biology has entered an era in which interdisciplinary cooperation is at an all-time high, practical applications follow basic discoveries more quickly than ever before, and new technologiesâ€"recombinant DNA, scanning tunneling microscopes, and moreâ€"are revolutionizing the way science is conducted. The potential for scientific breakthroughs with significant implications for society has never been greater. Opportunities in Biology reports on the state of the new biology, taking a detailed look at the disciplines of biology; examining the advances made in medicine, agriculture, and other fields; and pointing out promising research opportunities. Authored by an expert panel representing a variety of viewpoints, this volume also offers recommendations on how to meet the infrastructure needsâ€"for funding, effective information systems, and other supportâ€"of future biology research. Exploring what has been accomplished and what is on the horizon, Opportunities in Biology is an indispensable resource for students, teachers, and researchers in all subdisciplines of biology as well as for research administrators and those in funding agencies.
Download or read book Intended Evolution written by Dongxun Zhang and published by Greenleaf Book Group. This book was released on 2015-05-05 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover a new outlook on the process of life—and improve your health as a result In Intended Evolution, authors Dongxun and Bob Zhang introduce a different perspective on the theory of evolution: Life is not only selected by nature but intentionally interacts with it, learning how to better its future. They explain that applying this idea to generally accepted principles of biology can have startling results in your ability to affect your own health—and even your evolution. According to the theory of intended evolution, organisms gather information through sensory experience and use that knowledge to effect change in themselves and their environments. The authors propose that organisms use this saved information to make choices projected to enhance their survival. It is through experience, choices, and action, within a given environment, that life changes itself from moment to moment and determines what changes are needed for future generations. Because of humans’ unique ability to understand how our own evolution functions, we can effect changes within ourselves to influence and enhance our health and fitness, even to lengthen our lifespan.
Download or read book Relentless Evolution written by John N. Thompson and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2013-04-15 with total page 510 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At a glance, most species seem adapted to the environment in which they live. Yet species relentlessly evolve, and populations within species evolve in different ways. Evolution, as it turns out, is much more dynamic than biologists realized just a few decades ago. In Relentless Evolution, John N. Thompson explores why adaptive evolution never ceases and why natural selection acts on species in so many different ways. Thompson presents a view of life in which ongoing evolution is essential and inevitable. Each chapter focuses on one of the major problems in adaptive evolution: How fast is evolution? How strong is natural selection? How do species co-opt the genomes of other species as they adapt? Why does adaptive evolution sometimes lead to more, rather than less, genetic variation within populations? How does the process of adaptation drive the evolution of new species? How does coevolution among species continually reshape the web of life? And, more generally, how are our views of adaptive evolution changing? Relentless Evolution draws on studies of all the major forms of life—from microbes that evolve in microcosms within a few weeks to plants and animals that sometimes evolve in detectable ways within a few decades. It shows evolution not as a slow and stately process, but rather as a continual and sometimes frenetic process that favors yet more evolutionary change.
