Animal Evolution In Changing Environments

Author : Richard Levins
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 134 pages
File Size : 49,8 Mb
Release : 2020-03-31
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780691209418

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Evolution in Changing Environments by Richard Levins Pdf

Professor Levins, one of the leading explorers in the field of integrated population biology, considers the mutual interpenetration and joint evolution of organism and environment, occurring on several levels at once. Physiological and behavioral adaptations to short-term fluctuations of the environment condition the responses of populations to long-term changes and geographic gradients. These in turn affect the way species divide the environments among themselves in communities, and, therefore, the numbers of species which can coexist. Environment is treated here abstractly as pattern: patchiness, variability, range, etc. Populations are studied in their patterns: local heterogeneity, geographic variability, faunistic diversity, etc.

Author : Ryuichi Matsuda
Publisher : Wiley-Interscience
Page : 392 pages
File Size : 52,8 Mb
Release : 1987
Category : Nature
ISBN : UCSD:31822002420008

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Animal Evolution in Changing Environments by Ryuichi Matsuda Pdf

Explored in this book are the effect of environmental changes on most animals (especially poiilothermic animals) at two levels, the proximate process, where environmental changes affect their development, and the ultimate process level, where natural selection acts on the changes undergone during the proximate process. It reexamines neo-Lamarckism in light of 20th century biology and shows it as a major pattern of evolution. The book also focuses on how environmental factors influence endocrine balances that in turn affect gene regulation.

Author : Paul R. Ehrlich,Anne H. Ehrlich
Publisher : Island Press
Page : 472 pages
File Size : 43,5 Mb
Release : 2008-06-30
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781597264600

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The Dominant Animal by Paul R. Ehrlich,Anne H. Ehrlich Pdf

In humanity’s more than 100,000 year history, we have evolved from vulnerable creatures clawing sustenance from Earth to a sophisticated global society manipulating every inch of it. In short, we have become the dominant animal. Why, then, are we creating a world that threatens our own species? What can we do to change the current trajectory toward more climate change, increased famine, and epidemic disease? Renowned Stanford scientists Paul R. Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich believe that intelligently addressing those questions depends on a clear understanding of how we evolved and how and why we’re changing the planet in ways that darken our descendants’ future. The Dominant Animal arms readers with that knowledge, tracing the interplay between environmental change and genetic and cultural evolution since the dawn of humanity. In lucid and engaging prose, they describe how Homo sapiens adapted to their surroundings, eventually developing the vibrant cultures, vast scientific knowledge, and technological wizardry we know today. But the Ehrlichs also explore the flip side of this triumphant story of innovation and conquest. As we clear forests to raise crops and build cities, lace the continents with highways, and create chemicals never before seen in nature, we may be undermining our own supremacy. The threats of environmental damage are clear from the daily headlines, but the outcome is far from destined. Humanity can again adapt—if we learn from our evolutionary past. Those lessons are crystallized in The Dominant Animal. Tackling the fundamental challenge of the human predicament, Paul and Anne Ehrlich offer a vivid and unique exploration of our origins, our evolution, and our future.

Author : Richard Levins
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 144 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 1968
Category : Science
ISBN : UOM:39015002207820

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Evolution in Changing Environments by Richard Levins Pdf

Professor Levins, one of the leading explorers in the field of integrated population biology, considers the mutual interpenetration and joint evolution of organism and environment, occurring on several levels at once. Physiological and behavioral adaptations to short-term fluctuations of the environment condition the responses of populations to long-term changes and geographic gradients. These in turn affect the way species divide the environments among themselves in communities, and, therefore, the numbers of species which can coexist. Environment is treated here abstractly as pattern: patchiness, variability, range, etc. Populations are studied in their patterns: local heterogeneity, geographic variability, faunistic diversity, etc.

Author : John Cockrem,Edward Narayan
Publisher : Frontiers Media SA
Page : 145 pages
File Size : 49,7 Mb
Release : 2022-11-15
Category : Science
ISBN : 9782889768165

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Individual Variation and Responses of Animals to Changing Environments by John Cockrem,Edward Narayan Pdf

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 120 pages
File Size : 40,8 Mb
Release : 1968
Category : Electronic
ISBN : OCLC:637057903

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Evolution in Changing Environments by Anonim Pdf

Author : Patrick Bateson
Publisher : Open Book Publishers
Page : 134 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 2017-02-20
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781783742516

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Behaviour, Development and Evolution by Patrick Bateson Pdf

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.

Author : Menno Schilthuizen
Publisher : Quercus Publishing
Page : 304 pages
File Size : 51,8 Mb
Release : 2018-02-08
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781786481078

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Darwin Comes to Town by Menno Schilthuizen Pdf

See your city through fresh eyes We are marching towards a future in which three-quarters of humans live in cities, and a large portion of the planet's landmass is urbanized. With much of the rest covered by human-shaped farms, pasture, and plantations, where can nature still go? To the cities -- is Menno Schilthuizen's answer in this remarkable book. And with more and more wildlife carving out new niches among humans, evolution takes a surprising turn. Urban animals evolve to become more cheeky and resourceful, city pigeons develop detox-plumage, and weeds growing from cracks in the pavement get a new type of seeds. City blackbirds are even on their way of becoming an entirely new species, which we could name Turdus urbanicus. Thanks to evolutionary adaptation taking place at unprecedented speeds, plants and animals are coming up with new ways of living in the seemingly hostile environments of asphalt and steel that we humans have created. We are on the verge of a new chapter in the history of life, Schilthuizen says -- a chapter in which much old biodiversity is, sadly, disappearing, but also one in which a new and exciting set of life forms is being born. Menno Schilthuizen shows us that evolution in cities can happen far more rapidly, and strangely, than Darwin had dared dream.

Author : Jean Clobert,Michel Baguette,Tim G. Benton,James M. Bullock
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 496 pages
File Size : 40,9 Mb
Release : 2012-09-27
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780191640360

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Dispersal Ecology and Evolution by Jean Clobert,Michel Baguette,Tim G. Benton,James M. Bullock Pdf

Now that so many ecosystems face rapid and major environmental change, the ability of species to respond to these changes by dispersing or moving between different patches of habitat can be crucial to ensuring their survival. Understanding dispersal has become key to understanding how populations may persist. Dispersal Ecology and Evolution provides a timely and wide-ranging overview of the fast expanding field of dispersal ecology, incorporating the very latest research. The causes, mechanisms, and consequences of dispersal at the individual, population, species, and community levels are considered. Perspectives and insights are offered from the fields of evolution, behavioural ecology, conservation biology, and genetics. Throughout the book theoretical approaches are combined with empirical data, and care has been taken to include examples from as wide a range of species as possible - both plant and animal.

Author : John Tyler Bonner
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 218 pages
File Size : 52,8 Mb
Release : 1980
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN : 0691023735

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The Evolution of Culture in Animals by John Tyler Bonner Pdf

Animals do have culture, maintains this delightfully illustrated and provocative book, which cites a number of fascinating instances of animal communication and learning. John Bonner traces the origins of culture back to the early biological evolution of animals and provides examples of five categories of behavior leading to nonhuman culture: physical dexterity, relations with other species, auditory communication within a species, geographic locations, and inventions or innovations. Defining culture as the transmission of information by behavioral rather than genetical means, he demonstrates the continuum between the traits we find in animals and those we often consider uniquely human.

Author : Robert A. Wallace
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 374 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 1973
Category : Psychology
ISBN : UOM:39076006445808

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The Ecology and Evolution of Animal Behavior by Robert A. Wallace Pdf

Author : Mary Jane West-Eberhard
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 820 pages
File Size : 55,6 Mb
Release : 2003-04-10
Category : Psychology
ISBN : 0195122356

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Developmental Plasticity and Evolution by Mary Jane West-Eberhard Pdf

West-Eberhard is widely recognized as one of the most incisive thinkers in evolutionary biology. This book assesses all the evidence for our current understanding of the role of changes in body plan and development for the process of speciation. The process of evolution is systematically reassessed to integrate the insights coming from developmental genetics. Every serious student of evolution, and a substantial share of developmental biologists and geneticists, will need to take note of this contribution. The timing is clearly ripe for the synthesis that this work will help bring about.

Author : Sonia E. Sultan
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 224 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 2015-09-10
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780191066610

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Organism and Environment by Sonia E. Sultan Pdf

Over the past decade, advances in both molecular developmental biology and evolutionary ecology have made possible a new understanding of organisms as dynamic systems interacting with their environments. This innovative book synthesizes a wealth of recent research findings to examine how environments influence phenotypic expression in individual organisms (ecological development or 'eco-devo'), and how organisms in turn alter their environments (niche construction). A key argument explored throughout the book is that ecological interactions as well as natural selection are shaped by these dual organism-environment effects. This synthesis is particularly timely as biologists seek a unified contemporary framework in which to investigate the developmental outcomes, ecological success, and evolutionary prospects of organisms in rapidly changing environments. Organism and Environment is an advanced text suitable for graduate level students taking seminar courses in ecology, evolution, and developmental biology, as well as academics and researchers in these fields.

Author : National Research Council,Division on Earth and Life Studies,Board on Earth Sciences and Resources,Committee on the Earth System Context for Hominin Evolution
Publisher : National Academies Press
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 48,5 Mb
Release : 2010-04-17
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780309148382

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Understanding Climate's Influence on Human Evolution by National Research Council,Division on Earth and Life Studies,Board on Earth Sciences and Resources,Committee on the Earth System Context for Hominin Evolution Pdf

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.

Author : George W. Cox
Publisher : Island Press
Page : 400 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 2013-04-10
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9781597268356

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Alien Species and Evolution by George W. Cox Pdf

In Alien Species and Evolution, biologist George W. Cox reviews and synthesizes emerging information on the evolutionary changes that occur in plants, animals, and microbial organisms when they colonize new geographical areas, and on the evolutionary responses of the native species with which alien species interact. The book is broad in scope, exploring information across a wide variety of taxonomic groups, trophic levels, and geographic areas. It examines theoretical topics related to rapid evolutionary change and supports the emerging concept that species introduced to new physical and biotic environments are particularly prone to rapid evolution. The author draws on examples from all parts of the world and all major ecosystem types, and the variety of examples used gives considerable insight into the patterns of evolution that are likely to result from the massive introduction of species to new geographic regions that is currently occurring around the globe. Alien Species and Evolution is the only state-of-the-art review and synthesis available of this critically important topic, and is an essential work for anyone concerned with the new science of invasion biology or the threats posed by invasive species.