Scientists show that the extraordinary diversity of cichlid fish in Africa's Lake Victoria was made possible by "genetic recycling"—repeated cycles of new species appearing and rapidly adapting to different roles in the ...
Evolution
Sep 29, 2023
0
193
Clownfish, renowned for their vibrant colors and unusual symbiotic relationship with sea anemones, have long captivated the imagination of scientists and nature enthusiasts alike. They also serve as a promising model organism ...
Evolution
Jul 17, 2023
0
38
Adaptive radiation, a process in which many new species explode and occupy different ecological niches in a short time, can rapidly promote speciation and enrich species diversity. Genomic analyses have shown that phylogenies ...
Plants & Animals
Jun 7, 2023
0
3
Adaptive radiations represent rapid branching in the tree of life and are recognized as critical drivers of biodiversity. Studies on them is central to understand the mechanisms that drive speciation, diversification, and ...
Evolution
Sep 8, 2022
0
3
North America's freshwater mussels are both impressively diverse and highly imperiled. Nearly 300 species occur in the United States and Canada, and up to 40 species of the hard-shelled bottom dwellers can be found on a single ...
Plants & Animals
Nov 16, 2021
0
63
Plants are DNA hoarders. Adhering to the maxim of never throwing anything out that might be useful later, they often duplicate their entire genome and hang on to the added genetic baggage. All those extra genes are then free ...
Evolution
Jul 19, 2021
0
127
Biologists use the term "adaptive radiation" to describe a phenomenon in which new species rapidly evolve from an ancestral species, often in response to changes in the local environment that lead to new biological niches ...
Plants & Animals
Apr 28, 2021
0
77
Lake Tanganyika in Africa is a true hotspot of organismal diversity. Approximately 240 species of cichlid fishes have evolved in this lake in less than 10 million years. A research team from the University of Basel has investigated ...
Plants & Animals
Nov 18, 2020
0
53
Adaptive radiation—the rapid evolution of many new species from a single ancestor—is a major focus in evolutionary biology. Adaptive radiations often show remarkable repeatability where lineages have undergone multiple ...
Evolution
Oct 7, 2020
0
22
Challenging a 75-year-old notion about how and when reptiles evolved during the past 300 million-plus years involves a lot of camerawork, loads of CT scanning, and, most of all, thousands of miles of travel. Just check the ...
Evolution
Oct 7, 2020
5
2320
