Recently in Evolution Category

Photograph by Kurt Andreas.

Photography contest, Honorable Mention.

Toxomerus marginatus – hoverfly. See also here.

The Proceedings of the 44^th Carnival of Evolution are up on Atavism. The Proceedings include

Session 1. Symposium on the evolution of novelty

Session 2. Evolutionary ecology and life history evolution

Session 3. Philosophy and evolution

Session 4a. Experimental Evolution

Session 4b. Timing and tempo of evolution

Session 5. Outreach and anti-creationism

and a Poster session.

Science Foundation Arizona is sponsoring a postdoctoral scholar program at Arizona State University that offers a really sweet deal:

Bisgrove Scholars will receive an annual stipend of $60,000, benefits and an additional $20,000 per year for research expenses. The Bisgrove appointment is renewable on a year-to-year basis for a maximum initial term of two years, contingent upon the availability of funds.

This program is only open to individuals who have no prior post-doctoral experience and obtain a PhD prior to appointment, i.e. doctoral students in their last year of studies. So while you may be now eating ramen every night in the lab while trying to finish up the last experiment you need to graduate, this time next year, you could be eating ramen sprinkled with gold dust and angel tears, while trying to finish up the last experiment you need for a grant proposal. (Did I mention that rent is cheap here?)

Another qualification is that your research has to fit with the Science Foundation Arizona’s mission: “Areas include, diagnosis and prevention of disease, sustainable energy and the environment, and information and communications technologies at the human interface.”

You will also need to specify possible mentors for your research project. (Hey, I’m available!)

For instructions on how to apply, see http://graduate.asu.edu/bisgrove.

Applications due Feb 15^th.

Photograph by Arthur Rosen.

Alces alces – moose, Denali National Park, Alaska.

Do you know of any graduating or recently graduated baccalaurate students who are considering graduate school? Do they come from disadvantaged backgrounds or belong to underrepresented groups in biomedical sciences? If so, then ASU has a program built for them: ASU PREP.

PREP scholars spend 75% of their time working as technicians on a research project under the direction of an experienced ASU faculty mentor, in a laboratory with PhD graduate students and/or postdoctoral fellows. The program director and faculty advisory committee help scholars identify the research area and mentor that best matches the interests and goals of each scholar. Scholars receive a salary of $21,000 per year. Scholars participate in a one to two year program, dependent on each individualized development plan.

Applicants must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents that have completed their undergraduate degree from an accredited U.S. college or university within the last three years. Applicants must intend to apply to a Ph.D. graduate program within two years. Individuals who contribute to the diversity of the graduate student community and to the biomedical or behavioral sciences, at ASU and nationally, are strongly encouraged to apply.

Application deadline is March 30, 2012

See http://graduate.asu.edu/prep for full details and application instructions.

The Cartwright Lab at Arizona State University is seeking Postdoctoral Research Associates in the area of Computational Evolutionary Genetics (broadly defined). The Cartwright Lab is part of The Center for Evolutionary Medicine and Informatics (CEMI), one of 10 research centers in the Arizona State University’s Biodesign Institute.

Research in the Cartwright Lab covers many different questions in population genetics and molecular evolution, at the interface of biology, statistics, and computer science. A majority of our research involves developing, implementing, and applying novel methodologies to study genomic datasets. Potential research topics for postdoctoral research associates include

• The study of mutation patterns between human families and across species, using data from next-generation sequencing. This includes both indel and point-mutation patterns.
• Models of frequency-dependent selection, with applications to genomic data.
• New methods for alignment and phylogeny reconstruction that take into account the uncertainty of genomic data.
• New methods for simulating homologous sequences that can be optimized to mimic natural datasets.

For more information see http://scit.us/ or http://labs.biodesign.asu.edu/cartwright/.

To apply, forward one document that includes a cover letter, detailed CV, and 3 references to [Enable javascript to see this email address.]. Please put the job title in the subject line of the letter. The initial closing date is January 31, 2012, Applications will continue to be accepted and considered until the job is filled/closed. A background check is required for employment. ASU is an EO/AA employer and is committed to excellence through diversity.

See full ad at http://www.biodesign.asu.edu/jobs/p[…]-12-15-11-54

Contact Dr. Cartwright at [Enable javascript to see this email address.] or 480-965-9949 for more information.

Photograph by David Young.

Bear Lake, Rocky Mountain National Park. Yes, this really is Bear Lake.

Charles Darwin in 1816. Detail of a painting by Ellen Sharples. Public domain.

And the Center for Inquiry provides a short list of resources for campus organizations or anyone else who wants to sponsor an event. In particular, you may contact their speakers bureau to find speakers on evolution, creationism, and intelligent-design creationism (it is a complete mystery why hardly anyone from Panda’s Thumb is on that list, but we will not go into that now). Additionally, Center for Inquiry directs you to the International Darwin Day Foundation, where you may find a list of activities near you, and, of course, the National Center for Science Education.

CFI recommends that you try to teach someone about evolution or other scientific principles and notes that the Public Broadcasting System has a wealth of material on evolution, science, and Darwin. The Understanding Evolution Web page is likewise an excellent resource.

Finally, not mentioned by CFI, the Clergy Letter Project lists 400-odd religious congregations that plan Evolution Weekend activities, February 10-12. Indeed, it may be of interest to some that Science can help church keep its young folk.

Photograph by David Young.

Nymph Lake – the lake is a short hike above Bear Lake. The water lily is (I presume) Nymphaea polysepala. And welcome back to Reed, who (I also presume) is happily ensconced in Arizona.

A couple of years ago the late Lynn Margulis generated a flap in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by shepherding a paper through PNAS’s editorial process that advocated the notion that butterflies are the result of an ancient symbiotic relationship between “worm-like and winged ancestors.”

I was reminded of that flap the other day while I was reading Alfred Russel Wallace’s autobiography. Wallace mentions an 1872 talk he gave to the Entomological Society in which he described Herbert Spencer’s hypothesis that segmented insects are the result of an aggregation of once-separate ancestors:

In 1872, in my presidential address to the Entomological Society, I endeavoured to expound Herbert Spencer’s theory of the origin of insects, on the view that they are fundamentally compound animals, each segment representing one of the original independent organisms. (Volume II, Chapter XXVI, unpaginated in my Nook version)

The reference is to Spencer’s The Principles of Biology, Volume II, Chapter IV, where the proposal is developed on pp 93ff. The link is to Spencer’s 1899 revision of the 1867 first edition; Wallace would have used the 1867 edition as the basis for his talk.

So the preacher in Ecclesiastes was right: there’s nothing new under the sun.

By James DeGregori and Michael Antolin

The journal Evolution: Education and Outreach (EVOO) had dedicated the December issue to evolutionary medicine, with articles on how evolutionary theories are critical for understanding human disease and why thorough classroom instruction in evolution is essential. The publisher Springer has made the journal freely available through the end of December. Many of the articles are written for a broad audience and should be of interest to specialists and non-specialists alike.

The special issue was edited by Kristin Jenkins of the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center and Michael Antolin of Colorado State University, and in part follows a symposium organized for the 2011 annual meetings of the Society of the Study of Evolution held June 19 in Norman, Oklahoma. The purpose of that symposium broadly overlaps the EVOO special issue: to make biologists who teach evolution at every level from secondary school to medical school aware of how much biomedical science gains from understanding human evolution and our continued vulnerability to disease. An additional goal is to increase understanding and acceptance of evolutionary science in biomedical research and to help doctors become better practitioners.

Humans have a unique form of complex communication called language. While some academics have argued that language is a purely cultural invention—Humans used their brilliant brains to reason that language was the best way to communicate.—there is ample evidence that language is a biological adaptation that evolved after our ancestors split from the ancestors of chimpanzees. For example, the face, mouth, and throat contain adaptations for the physical production of spoken language. Children acquire language through an innate ability, not using their higher reasoning skills. And regions of the brain have been shown to be critical locations for cognition specifically associated with language.

As a complex adaptation, there must be some genes underlying our language ability. However, the evolutionary dynamics of language-associated genes is poorly understood. Earlier this year, I published some research that I hope will help fill this gap. (I’ve been working on this research off and on for nearly 10 years.) The paper is entitled “Bards, Poets, and Cliques: Frequency-Dependent Selection and the Evolution of Language Genes” and appeared in the Bulletin of Mathematical Biology. The journal is offering free access this month, so you can download the paper for free.

As a complex adaptation, language did not miraculously evolve all at once. As the saying goes, natura non facit saltum (nature does not do “poof”). Likely the communication ability of our ancestors passed through several stages eventually producing moden language ability. Some well studied transitions are the origin of combinatoric language from holistic communication and the replacement of hand gestures with vocal communication.

Now imagine that you have a human population that contains two different language phenotypes. “Bards” have the ancestral phenotype, and “Poets” have a new phenotype that is potentially more efficient and fitter.—Two Poets interacting have a higher fitness than two Bards.—This increase in fitness can come from the ability of poets to confer more information to one another, communicate more accurately, or many other things. Note, we are talking about biological differences in language faculty, not cultural differences like whether Bards speak French and Poets speak Cajun.

Photograph by James Rice.

Photography contest, Honorable Mention

Underground lake, Chapat Cave, Belize. This lake is the home of cave-adapted fish, crabs, and other life. Scientists are interested in the hydrology of Chapat Cave, since it is known to flood as much as a hundred feet above the normal level shown here. The timing and cause of the floods is not yet known.

Photograph by James Rice.

Bonneville Salt Flats, Great Salt Lake Desert, Utah. The bird in the foreground is a Warthog .

Photograph by Michael Roberts.

Photography contest, Honorable Mention.

Cwm Idwal, a hanging valley in North Wales.

Mr. Roberts adds, “Darwin’s favourite place. This is looking down into Cwm Idwal in Snowdonia, which Darwin visited several times in the 1820s and in August 1831 just before he received the invite for the Beagle and in 1842 when he was studying glaciation.

“In 1831 Darwin studied the rocks, which are mostly Ordovician volcanics, but was a bit confused by them. He was on his own and wrote to Sedgwick for advice. In 1842 (halfway through writing his first draft on “his Theory”) he returned and found clear evidence of glaciation. To the right of the lake (Llyn Idwal) was an ice fall which Darwin called a vomitory. The dark cliffs on the left are Ordovician volcanics, which he thought were basalt.”

You may find Mr. Roberts’s article on Darwin’s fieldwork here, but you will not find it cheaply..

Photograph by Richard Hughes.

Photography contest, Honorable Mention.

Tabanus subsimilis – striped horsefly, likely a male who landed there to drink juices from the surrounding berries, Jackson, Tennessee. For more images of bug eyes see http://www.metro.co.uk/news/picture[…]-close-ups/1

The eminent biologist Lynn Margulis has died at 73. Dr. Margulis is best known for promoting the theory, now generally accepted, that organelles such as the cell nucleus mitochondrion (I knew that!) and the chloroplast are the result of symbiosis between different species. You may read the Times obituary here.