MODULE 14: EVOLUTION

PA I R A N D S H A R E

Why do you think understanding

evolution is important?
 L E SS O N 1
C H A R L E S DA RW I N A N D T H E
T H E O RY O F E V O L U T I O N BY
N AT U R A L S E L E C T I O N

 Charles Darwin pieced together our current understanding

of how life changes over time and why
 This began with a 5-year trip across the coast of South
America and the Galapagos Islands.
 During this time, he was a naturalist collecting and studying
samples that were geological and biological in nature
 Darwin’s collected Finches sparked a question – finches
from the mainland were very similar to but not the same as
island finches and new to Europe – this illustrated that
species change due to environment – but how and why?
 A RT I F I C I A L
SELECTION

• An ornithologist named John Gould provided

the information Darwin needed to piece
together his idea of change based on
environment – an idea he decided to explore
better
• Darwin turned to dove breeders for connecting
the dots
• He found that breeders frequently picked out
doves with desirable traits like a fan tail and
bred pairs of them to produce more fantailed
offspring
• He termed this artificial selection and
 N AT U RA L
SELECTION

• Further considering the possibility of natural

selection, Darwin turned to an essay of
economist Thomas Malthus who introduced
the idea of competition for the human
population
• Darwin saw that those who possessed traits
that gave them an edge when obtaining
resources would obtain them first, survive, and
reproduce
• He also saw that those without resources
would gradually fade out through death and a
lack of reproduction
T U R N A N D TA L K

Answer these questions on one blank sheet of paper per pair

and submit for 10 points credit
1) Who is Charles Darwin?
2) What is natural selection?
3) How are natural and artificial selection different and
similar?
 L E SS O N 2
EVIDENCE FOR
EVOLUTION
• Fossils
• Comparative
anatomy
• Vestigial structures
• Comparative
embryology
• Comparative
molecular biology
• Geographic
distribution
 • Show gradual change over time of related
organisms
FOSSIL • Sometimes show that an organism has been
RECORD unchanged for a VERY long time like the
horseshoe crab

Armadillo
C O M PA R AT I V E A N AT O M Y
HOMOLOG OUS STRUC TURE S A N A LO G O U S S T R U C T U R E S

These are homologous (having the same Analogous structures can look similar and
relative position) structures that have have similar purposes, but do not come
come from an ancestral relative and from common ancestors
may be shared by current relatives

Inheritance of a structure based on appearance alone isn’t

possible
 VESTIGIAL
STRUCTURES

1. These are homologous (having

the same relative position)
structures that have come from
an ancestral relative and may
be shared by current relatives
which have lost or reduced
function or usefulness
Bird Embryo

C O M PA R AT I V E E M B RYO L O GY

• An embryo is an early prebirth

developmental stage or an organism
• Vertebrate embryos provide insight
Mammal Embryo into evolutionary relationships
during their formation
• These related embryos have
homologous structures during their
formation, in certain phases of
development that grow into
completely different structures in
adult forms
1.Common amino acid sequences C O M PA R AT I V E
indicate interrelatedness and a shared MOLECULAR
evolutionary history between B I O L O GY
organism types

2. This is true for proteins AND for DNA and

RNA
3. Patterns seen in these shared materials
match the patterns that indicate relatedness
in comparative anatomy and embryology,
and the fossil record
 G E O G RA P H I C
DISTRIBUTION

• The study of the distribution of plants and animals

English Rabbit around the world is called biogeography.
South American Mara • Animals that are closer together geographically
tend to share a higher degree of interrelatedness
• Conversely animals of similar types that are
further apart tend to share less in terms of
common genetics, amino acid sequences, and
structures
• Plants often migrated more freely than animals
since seeds could carry on wind or on flying
animals, leading to more diversity per area
CONSENSUS MAP

 Get into groups of 3-5

 Each group will be assigned one type of evidence for evolution
 Each group members name on paper
 Define evidence and explain how it IS evidence for evolution
 Each group member must find an example of that evidence type and put it
on the consensus map.
 Groups will share their examples with the rest of the class coming up front
to share the examples they found
N AT U R A L S E L E C T I O N
LEADS TO
A D A P TAT I O N
 Fitness

 Camouflage

 Mimicry

 Antimicrobial resistance

 Not ALL features of an organism

are adaptive – we used to think
that the helplessness of babies
was to gain attention and
nurturing – but it is not, it is a
result of out narrow pelvises that
provide the ability to walk upright
and force us to give birth at a
developmentally early stage
L E SS O N 3
SHAPING
E VO LU T I O N A RY
T H E O RY
our Things that Evolution Relies On

Increase of number
There must be
of individuals in a
genetic variation
species must be
within the species
able to occur

The number of
individuals who are
Individuals must
better equipped to
compete for limited
survive and
resources
reproduce must
increase

Conclusion: Evolution occurs at

the population level with genes
as the mechanism for change
 PA I R A N D S H A R E

Each pair of students will be assigned one

of the four things evolution relies on and
will then share an example where the
scenario applied with the rest of the class
T H E H A R DY- W E I N B E R G P R I N C I P L E

If there is genetic equilibrium no

Fortunately, this doesn’t happen

States that when allelic

frequencies remain
constant, a population is in
genetic equilibrium
 GENETIC DRIFT

• Founder Effect – this is an extreme example of

genetic drift in which a small group from a population
separates from the original population taking with it a
What is it? much smaller pool of genetics which may have been
less common before, growing with this offshoot
Genetic drift is any allelic change in a
community and changing the allele balance within the
population that occurs by chance separated population. (Found in the Tiburon Island
bighorn sheep, in Amish communities)
How does it affect evolution?
The smaller subpopulation is more • Bottleneck – this is another extreme example of
sensitive changes in alleles and may genetic drift in which a population is severely
decreased and then regrows from a reduced less
carry some alleles in greater ratios than
diverse gene pool of a much smaller group reducing
the original population –can lead to
the diversity of alleles in a newly regrown and sizeable
speciation population and potentially causing infertility as a
 G E NE F LOW

What is it?
Gene flow is the introduction of
new genes to a population through
the migration of one of more
individuals to different populations

How does it affect

evolution?
This reduces differences between
populations while increasing
variation in each population’s
genetic diversity
 N O N - RA N D O M M AT I N G

 Mating within a population is not likely to

occur evenly across an area with organisms
at one end of a geographic area traveling to
mate with those at the opposite end, for
example
 Instead, individuals are likely to mate with
others in their area, and not separated by
geography, predators, or the environment
 This can cause inbreeding, a lack of genetic
diversity, and a change in allelic proportions
which keeps the possibility of evolution
open by disrupting equilibrium
 M U TAT I O N

 Mutations are changes to genes that can be functional or even advantageous,

benign or not causing difference, or cancerous causing unregulated growth of
unspecialized tissue
 Advantageous mutations may cause shifts in allele ratios favoring the advantageous
genotype
 Cancerous mutations may cause loss of genetic diversity through the loss of
individuals and/or population reduction
 What is it?
 A mechanism of N AT U RA L S E L E C T I O N
evolution, and a
process in which the
phenotypes that
best lend
themselves to
survival persist
through surviving
individuals across
generations of
reproduction and
shift the allelic ratio
of populations
towards genotypes
that yield that
 CONSENSUS MAP

 Phenomena that take a population out of equilibrium – each group will be

assigned one phenomenon and will define it in a consensus map, and then
provide one example per group member of its occurrence
N AT U RA L S E L E C T I O N : S TA B I L I Z I N G ,
DISRUPTIVE, & DIRECTIONAL

https://youtu.be/ewOAGMGI8bI?feature=shared
 N AT U R A L
SELECTION:
SEXUAL SELECTION
 This is often marked by sexual
dimorphism, or the differing
appearance of males and females
 Bigger or more colorful (usually)
males have better reproductive
success and pass along their genetic
information to future generations
shifting the allele ratio towards those
that encode for brighter colors and
larger sizes despite any survival
chances of the individual
 Some modern-day scientists do NOT
consider this part of natural selection
 R E P R O D U C T I V E I S O L AT I O N
What is it?
The inability of two species, one newly formed, to produce viable
offspring due to behavioral, geographical, or physical
incompatibility

How does it affect evolution?

This is the point that most biologists consider a group of changed
or separated organisms to be a new species

Prezygotic Isolation Postzygotic Isolation

Prevents offspring from occuring Occurs after hybrid organism is
born
Geograpghy, behavior, ecology, Prevents offspring survival OR
etc.
Reduces chances for fertilization Prevents offspring reproduction
 S P E C I AT I O N
• Must have both reproductive
isolation and divergence
What is it?
Speciation is the • There are two types allopatric and
development of a new sympatric speciation
species from an
existing one • In allopatric speciation a barrier
exist between the original species
Allopatric speciation – Grand Canyon – opposite
and the newly forming one
rims

• In sympatric speciation occurs with

newly forming species living
alongside one another
 PAT T E R N S O F E V O LU T I O N – A D A P T I V E R A D I AT I O N
A N D C O N V E R G E N T E V O LU T I O N

https://youtu.be/mcM23M-CCog? https://youtu.be/1MBPzzXeTPg?
feature=shared feature=shared
PAT T E R N S O F E V O LU T I O N – C O E V O LU T I O N
 PAT T E R N S O F E V O LU T I O N – R AT E

 Evolution does NOT happen at a fixed rate

 The idea of gradualism suggests that evolution proceeds in small

gradual steps

 The Theory of Punctuated Equilibrium attempts to address the

sudden and rapid evolution of species such as found in arms race and
adaptive radiation by suggesting that there are punctuated short points in
time with rapid changed embedded in larger amounts of time with gradual
change
T H A N K YO U
Questions??