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Illuminating the processes and patterns that link genotype to phenotype, epigenetics seeks to explain features, characters, and developmental mechanisms that can only be understood in terms of interactions that arise above the level of the gene. With chapters written by leading authorities, this volume offers a broad integrative survey of epigenetics. Approaching this complex subject from a variety of perspectives, it presents a broad, historically grounded view that demonstrates the utility of this approach for understanding complex biological systems in development, disease, and evolution. Chapters cover such topics as morphogenesis and organ formation, conceptual foundations, and cell differentiation, and together demonstrate that the integration of epigenetics into mainstream developmental biology is essential for answering fundamental questions about how phenotypic traits are produced.
Thoroughly updated and reorganized, Strickberger's Evolution, Fourth Edition, presents biology students with a basic introduction to prevailing knowledge and ideas about evolution, discussing how, why, and where the world and its organisms changed throughout history. Keeping consistent with Strickberger's engaging writing style, the authors carefully unfold a broad range of philosophical and historical topics that frame the theories of today including cosmological and geological evolution and its impact on life, the origins of life on earth, the development of molecular pathways from genetic systems to organismic morphology and function, the evolutionary history of organisms from microbes to animals, and the numerous molecular and populational concepts thatexplain the earth's dynamic evolution.
Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection was based on the observation that there is variation between individuals within the same species. This fundamental observation is a central concept in evolutionary biology. However, variation is only rarely treated directly. It has remained peripheral to the study of mechanisms of evolutionary change. The explosion of knowledge in genetics, developmental biology, and the ongoing synthesis of evolutionary and developmental biology has made it possible for us to study the factors that limit, enhance, or structure variation at the level of an animals' physical appearance and behavior. Knowledge of the significance of variability is crucial to th...
A picture says more than a thousand words. This is something that we all know to be true. Imaging has been important since the early days of medicine and bi- ogy, as seen in the anatomical studies of Leonardo Da Vinci or Andreas Vesalius. More than 100 years ago, the ?rst noninvasive imaging technologies, such as K- rad Roentgen’s X-ray technology,were applied to the medical ?eld—and while still crude—revolutionized medical diagnosis. Today, every patient will be exposed to some kind of advanced imaging technology such as medical resonance imaging, computed tomography or four-dimensional ultrasound during their lifetime. Many diseases, such as brain tumors, are initially diagnosed sole...
It has been said that new discoveries and developments in the human, social, and natural sciences hang "in the air" (Bowler, 1983; 2008) prior to their consummation. While neo-Darwinist biology has been powerfully served by its mechanistic metaphysic and a reductionist methodology in which living organisms are considered machines, many of the chapters in this volume place this paradigm into question. Pairing scientists and philosophers together, this volume explores what might be termed "the New Frontiers" of biology, namely contemporary areas of research that appear to call an updating, a supplementation, or a relaxation of some of the main tenets of the Modern Synthesis. Such areas of investigation include: Emergence Theory, Systems Biology, Biosemiotics, Homeostasis, Symbiogenesis, Niche Construction, the Theory of Organic Selection (also known as "the Baldwin Effect"), Self-Organization and Teleodynamics, as well as Epigenetics. Most of the chapters in this book offer critical reflections on the neo-Darwinist outlook and work to promote a novel synthesis that is open to a greater degree of inclusivity as well as to a more holistic orientation in the biological sciences.
After volume 33, this book series was replaced by the journal "Evolutionary Biology." Please visit www.springer.com/11692 for further information. Volume 30 brings readers up to date on the investigation of eminent evolutionary biologists and paleobiologists. Contributions explore such topics as Adaptation in Drosophila and the role of cytochrome P450s Population genetics and species conservation of the cheetah germ-layer theory assymetry in the mammalian skeleton genetic diversity of marine fish the phenomenon of industrial melanism the variation in lizard cranal kinesis. Other chapters focus on such issues as overdominance and its relation to higher mutation-rate estimates and the use of molecular clocks in determining the rate of nucleotide substitution in higher plants.
Developmental Approaches to Human Evolution encapsulates the current state of evolutionary developmental anthropology. This emerging scientific field applies tools and approaches from modern developmental biology to understand the role of genetic and developmental processes in driving morphological and cognitive evolution in humans, non-human primates and in the laboratory organisms used to model these changes. Featuring contributions from well-established pioneers and emerging leaders, this volume is designed to build research momentum and catalyze future innovation in this burgeoning field. The book’s broad research scope encompasses soft and hard tissues of the head and body, including the skeleton, special senses and the brain. Developmental Approaches to Human Evolution is an invaluable resource on the mechanisms of primate and vertebrate evolution for scholars across a wide array of intersecting disciplines, including primatology, paleoanthropology, vertebrate morphology, evolutionary developmental biology and health sciences.
In recent times, the philosophy of science has been reinvigorated by insights from the biological and cognitive sciences. These disciplines have provided not only new perspectives to approach traditional philosophical problems but have also opened the way to new conceptual and methodological questions that call for new and innovative solutions. This book brings together some of the main debates that have structured in the last years the fields of philosophy of biology and cognitive sciences. It is organized around 11 chapters distributed in two parts: one devoted to the philosophy of biology, and the other to the cognitive sciences. These ideas were originally presented at the 11th edition o...
This volume provides a broad overview of some cutting-edge philosophical topics of growing interest at the juncture between cognitive science and biology. The main goal is not to integrate the variety of approaches into a single account, but rather to offer diverse perspectives on a collection of selected biological issues of particular philosophical relevance, reflecting the plurality of current research in these areas. Four conceptual vectors give this volume its coherence: Animal and human cognition: With respect to animal cognition, this volume focuses on self-awareness and methodological flaws in the science of animal consciousness. Regarding human cognition, the authors of this volume ...
Foreword by Phillip V. Tobias The introduction of rhesus macaques to Cayo Santiago, Puerto Rico in 1938, and the subsequent development of the CPRC for biomedical research, continues its long history of stimulating studies in physical anthropology. The CPRC monkey colonies, and the precise demographic data on the derived skeletal collection in the Center’s Laboratory of Primate Morphology and Genetics (LPMG), provide rare opportunities for morphological, developmental, functional, genetic, and behavioral studies across the life span of rhesus macaques as a species, and as a primate model for humans. The book grows out of a symposium Wang is organizing for the 78th annual meeting of the Ame...