Phylogeny, as a biological process, refers to the historical pattern of lineage splitting and character change that generates the evolutionary relationships among organisms or genes over time. It encompasses the processes of speciation, extinction, and divergence of traits driven by mutation, genetic drift, natural selection, recombination, and gene flow, which cumulatively produce branching evolutionary lineages. Phylogenetic processes operate across multiple temporal and spatial scales, shaping hierarchical biodiversity patterns and resulting in genealogical structures that can be inferred from comparative molecular, morphological, or genomic data, forming the basis for reconstructing evolutionary histories and testing macroevolutionary hypotheses.
The wild boar (Sus scrofa) is widely distributed across Eurasia and has also colonized the Japanese archipelago, where two subspecies are recognized: the Japanese wild boar (JWB, Sus scrofa leucomystax) and the Ryukyu wild ...
Plants & Animals
Aug 5, 2026
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7
A new study from the University of Kansas complicates the picture of primates living in North America some 55 million years ago during the Eocene, a warm period that allowed mammals to diversify quickly.
Evolution
Aug 4, 2026
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279
For more than 60 years, evolutionary biologists have debated whether a unique genetic system found in ants, bees and wasps helps explain one of nature's most remarkable innovations: eusociality, a form of social organization ...
Plants & Animals
Aug 4, 2026
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45
Smithsonian researchers have identified the genetic relationships among all Hawaiian honeycreeper species known to have existed—and subsequently faced major losses—since the arrival of Europeans to the islands.
Evolution
Aug 4, 2026
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11
The Asian longhorned tick, Haemaphysalis longicornis, spreads serious pathogens, including severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS) virus, Rickettsia and Theileria, and its bite can cause a meat allergy in humans. ...
Ecology
Aug 4, 2026
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6
A new study provides quantitative data on cranial vault thickness in Homo antecessor, based on the analysis of three parietal fragments recovered from the Gran Dolina site in the Sierra de Atapuerca, Burgos, Spain.
Evolution
Aug 3, 2026
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150
UC Berkeley researchers have identified regions of DNA that humans inherited from two unknown ancestors as a result of long-ago interbreeding among modern humans and at least four other archaic human relatives.
Evolution
Jul 30, 2026
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710
A research group led by Tetsuhiro Hatakeyama from the Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at the Institute of Science Tokyo has revealed how a seemingly self-destructive survival strategy could persist in yeast for hundreds ...
Evolution
Jul 27, 2026
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7
Fungal diseases are among the leading causes of crop destruction, threatening global food security and agricultural livelihoods. Among phytopathogenic fungi, anthracnose fungi and the rice blast fungus are known to share ...
Plants & Animals
Jul 27, 2026
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7
Fossil finds are exciting moments that sometimes introduce the world to an ancient mammal or dinosaur that existed millions of years ago. But a longstanding problem in paleontology is that fossils are often incomplete, and ...
Paleontology & Fossils
Jul 16, 2026
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