Ongoing evolutionary outcomes

• Main Author: Cutter, Asher D.
• Format: Book Part
• Language: unknown
• Published: Oxford University PressOxford 2023
• Subjects: The Ribs; baleen whales; narwhal*
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198874522.003.0010; https://academic.oup.com/book/chapter-pdf/50802474/oso-9780198874522-chapter-10.pdf

Abstract Explores the diversity of nature’s evolutionary outcomes to illustrate and inspire how future traits could be shaped by genetic welding. Shows the wonders of adaptation in nature, using themes of teeth, visual and odor sensation, body-size gigantism and dwarfism, and flight. Documents both living and extinct creatures with lessons from experiments and fossils, macroevolutionary patterns of diversification among species, microevolution within species, and molecular genetic mechanisms. Illustrates the constraints of physical laws and how animals skirt the boundaries of those laws. Highlights examples from sharks, baleen whales, narwhal, cichlid fish, dogs, beach mice, and birds, as well as the infrared vision of deep-sea fishes and the ribs-as-wings of lizards. Describes how the outcomes of evolution are works in progress, continuing to be subject to genetic change.