From Developmental Constraint to Evolvability
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Load more
Recommended publications
-
Why Call It Developmental Bias When It Is Just Development? Isaac Salazar-Ciudad1,2,3
Salazar-Ciudad Biology Direct (2021) 16:3 https://doi.org/10.1186/s13062-020-00289-w OPINION Open Access Why call it developmental bias when it is just development? Isaac Salazar-Ciudad1,2,3 Abstract The concept of developmental constraints has been central to understand the role of development in morphological evolution. Developmental constraints are classically defined as biases imposed by development on the distribution of morphological variation. This opinion article argues that the concepts of developmental constraints and developmental biases do not accurately represent the role of development in evolution. The concept of developmental constraints was coined to oppose the view that natural selection is all-capable and to highlight the importance of development for understanding evolution. In the modern synthesis, natural selection was seen as the main factor determining the direction of morphological evolution. For that to be the case, morphological variation needs to be isotropic (i.e. equally possible in all directions). The proponents of the developmental constraint concept argued that development makes that some morphological variation is more likely than other (i.e. variation is not isotropic), and that, thus, development constraints evolution by precluding natural selection from being all-capable. This article adds to the idea that development is not compatible with the isotropic expectation by arguing that, in fact, it could not be otherwise: there is no actual reason to expect that development could lead to isotropic morphological variation. It is then argued that, since the isotropic expectation is untenable, the role of development in evolution should not be understood as a departure from such an expectation. -
Getting to Evo-Devo: Concepts and Challenges for Students Learning Evolutionary Developmental Biology Anna Hiatt
Bryn Mawr College Scholarship, Research, and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College Biology Faculty Research and Scholarship Biology 2013 Getting to Evo-Devo: Concepts and Challenges for Students Learning Evolutionary Developmental Biology Anna Hiatt Gregory K. Davis Bryn Mawr College, [email protected] Caleb Trujillo Mark Terry Donald P. French See next page for additional authors Let us know how access to this document benefits ouy . Follow this and additional works at: http://repository.brynmawr.edu/bio_pubs Part of the Biology Commons Custom Citation Hiatt A, Davis GK, Trujillo C, Terry M, French DP, Price RM and Perez KE . "Getting to evo-devo: concepts and challenges for students learning evolutionary developmental biology". CBE-Life Sciences Education 12 (2013): 494-508. This paper is posted at Scholarship, Research, and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College. http://repository.brynmawr.edu/bio_pubs/10 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Authors Anna Hiatt, Gregory K. Davis, Caleb Trujillo, Mark Terry, Donald P. French, Rebecca M. Price, and Kathryn E. Perez This article is available at Scholarship, Research, and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College: http://repository.brynmawr.edu/ bio_pubs/10 CBE—Life Sciences Education Vol. 12, 494–508, Fall 2013 Article Getting to Evo-Devo: Concepts and Challenges for Students Learning Evolutionary Developmental Biology Anna Hiatt,*† Gregory K. Davis,‡ Caleb Trujillo,§ Mark Terry, Donald P. French,* Rebecca M. Price,¶ and Kathryn E. Perez** *Department of Zoology, Oklahoma -
Activities of The
activities of the Inhalt Contents Seite Page 2 1 Jahresrückblick und Struktur des KLI Review 2010 and Structure of the KLI 6 2 Projekte Projects 2.1 Bewerbungen / Applications 2.2 Junior Gastwissenschaftler / Junior Visiting Fellows 2.3 Postdoktoranden-Stipendien / Postdoctoral Fellowships 2.4 Senior Stipendiaten / Senior Fellows 2.5 Austausch-Stipendium / Exchange Felllowship 2.6 Gastwissenschaftler / Visiting Scientists 32 3 Wissenschaftliche Veranstaltungen Meetings and Lectures 3.1 Altenberg Workshops 3.2 Symposia 3.3 Rupert Riedl Lecture 3.4 Mittagsdiskussionen / Brown Bag Discussions 50 4 Publikationen Publications 4.1 Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology 4.2 Sammelbände und Bücher / Edited Volumes and Books 4.3 Fachartikel / Professional Papers 4.4 Artikel im Druck / Papers in Press 4.5 Zeitschrift Biological Theory / Journal 4.6 Vorträge und Kongressbeiträge / Scientific Presentations 70 5 Weitere Aktivitäten Further Activities 5.1 EASPLS Graduate Meeting 5.2 Zusätzliche Förderungen Jahresrückblick und Struktur des KLI Review 2010 and Structure of the KLI 61 Through its in-house activities and freshly conceived workshops and seminar series the KLI has uniquely provided a context for rethinking major questions in developmental, cognitive, and evolutionary biology. Stuart Newman, New York Medical College Jahresrückblick und Struktur des KLI Review 2010 and Structure of the KLI 1.1 Jahresrückblick 2010 The Year in Review Der weltweit zu beobachtende Wandel der akademischen Institutionen hat in 3 den letzten Jahren auch Österreich voll erfasst. Das Gespenst der „Nützlichkeit“ geht um. Teils erzwungen, teils in vorauseilendem bürokratischen Eifer bemessen die Universitäten ihre eigenen Leistungen immer mehr nach ökonomistischen Managementkriterien. Die eigentlichen Aufgaben der akademischen Einrichtun- gen – Erkennen, Verstehen, Analyse, Wissen, Kritik, Diskurs, Bildung – die funda- mental auf intellektueller Unabhängigkeit beruhen, werden unter dem Gewicht sogenannter Effizienzkriterien zunehmend zurückgedrängt. -
Evolution & Development
DOI: 10.1111/ede.12315 RESEARCH Developmental structuring of phenotypic variation: A case study with a cellular automata model of ontogeny Wim Hordijk1 | Lee Altenberg2 1Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research, Klosterneuburg, Abstract Austria Developmental mechanisms not only produce an organismal phenotype, but 2University of Hawai‘iatMānoa, they also structure the way genetic variation maps to phenotypic variation. ‘ Honolulu, Hawai i Here, we revisit a computational model for the evolution of ontogeny based on Correspondence cellular automata, in which evolution regularly discovered two alternative Wim Hordijk, Konrad Lorenz Institute for mechanisms for achieving a selected phenotype, one showing high modularity, Evolution and Cognition Research, the other showing morphological integration. We measure a primary variational Martinstrasse 12, 3400 Klosterneuburg, Austria. property of the systems, their distribution of fitness effects of mutation. We find Email: [email protected] that the modular ontogeny shows the evolution of mutational robustness and ontogenic simplification, while the integrated ontogeny does not. We discuss the wider use of this methodology on other computational models of development as well as real organisms. 1 | INTRODUCTION summarize, “almost anything can be changed if it shows phenotypic variation” and “combinations of traits, even The idea that phenotypic variation could ever be those unfavorably correlated, can be changed”). Once the “unbiased” is a historical artifact coming from two main premises of this “pan‐variationism” are accepted, pans- sources: First were the early characterizations of quanti- electionism is the natural conclusion—in other words, if tative genetic variation for single traits or small numbers variation is diffusing in every phenotypic direction, the of traits. -
Evolutionary Morphology, Innovation, and the Synthesis of Evolutionary and Developmental Biology
Biology and Philosophy 18: 309–345, 2003. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. Evolutionary Morphology, Innovation, and the Synthesis of Evolutionary and Developmental Biology ALAN C. LOVE Department of History and Philosophy of Science University of Pittsburgh CL 1017 Pittsburgh, PA 15260 U.S.A. E-mail: [email protected] Abstract. One foundational question in contemporary biology is how to ‘rejoin’ evolution and development. The emerging research program (evolutionary developmental biology or ‘evo- devo’) requires a meshing of disciplines, concepts, and explanations that have been developed largely in independence over the past century. In the attempt to comprehend the present separation between evolution and development much attention has been paid to the split between genetics and embryology in the early part of the 20th century with its codification in the exclusion of embryology from the Modern Synthesis. This encourages a characterization of evolutionary developmental biology as the marriage of evolutionary theory and embryology via developmental genetics. But there remains a largely untold story about the significance of morphology and comparative anatomy (also minimized in the Modern Synthesis). Functional and evolutionary morphology are critical for understanding the development of a concept central to evolutionary developmental biology, evolutionary innovation. Highlighting the discipline of morphology and the concepts of innovation and novelty provides an alternative way of conceptualizing the ‘evo’ and the ‘devo’ to be synthesized. Key words: comparative anatomy, developmental genetics, embryology, evolutionary developmental biology, innovation, morphology, novelty, synthesis, typology 1. Introduction and methodology ... problems concerned with the orderly development of the individual are unrelated to those of the evolution of organisms through time .. -
Macroevolutionary Freezing and the Janusian Nature of Evolvability: Is the Evolution (Of Profound Biological Novelty) Going to End?
Biosemiotics https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-018-9326-y ORIGINAL PAPER Macroevolutionary Freezing and the Janusian Nature of Evolvability: Is the Evolution (of Profound Biological Novelty) Going to End? Jan Toman1 & Jaroslav Flegr1 Received: 30 September 2017 /Accepted: 9 May 2018 # Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature 2018 Abstract In a macroevolutionary timescale, evolvability itself evolves. Lineages are sorted based on their ability to generate adaptive novelties, which leads to the optimi- zation of their genotype-phenotype map. The system of translation of genetic or epigenetic changes to the phenotype may reach significant horizontal and vertical complexity, and may even exhibit certain aspects of learning behaviour. This continu- ously evolving semiotic system probably enables the origin of complex yet functional and internally compatible adaptations. However, it also has a second, Bdarker^,side.As was pointed out by several authors, the same process gradually reduces the probability of the origination of significant evolutionary novelties. In a similar way to the evolution of societies, teachings, or languages, in which the growing number of internal linkages gradually solidifies their overall structure and the structure or interpretation of their constitutive elements, the evolutionary potential of lineages decreases during biological evolution. Possible adaptations become limited to small Bperipheral^ modifications. According to the Frozen Evolution theory, some of the proximate causes of this Bmacroevolutionary freezing^ are more pronounced or present exclusively in sexual lineages. Sorting based on the highest (remaining) evolvability probably leads to the establishment of certain structural features of complex organisms, e.g. the modular character of their development and morphology. -
Evodevo: an Ongoing Revolution?
philosophies Article EvoDevo: An Ongoing Revolution? Salvatore Ivan Amato Department of Cognitive Sciences, University of Messina, Via Concezione 8, 98121 Messina, Italy; [email protected] or [email protected] Received: 27 September 2020; Accepted: 2 November 2020; Published: 5 November 2020 Abstract: Since its appearance, Evolutionary Developmental Biology (EvoDevo) has been called an emerging research program, a new paradigm, a new interdisciplinary field, or even a revolution. Behind these formulas, there is the awareness that something is changing in biology. EvoDevo is characterized by a variety of accounts and by an expanding theoretical framework. From an epistemological point of view, what is the relationship between EvoDevo and previous biological tradition? Is EvoDevo the carrier of a new message about how to conceive evolution and development? Furthermore, is it necessary to rethink the way we look at both of these processes? EvoDevo represents the attempt to synthesize two logics, that of evolution and that of development, and the way we conceive one affects the other. This synthesis is far from being fulfilled, but an adequate theory of development may represent a further step towards this achievement. In this article, an epistemological analysis of EvoDevo is presented, with particular attention paid to the relations to the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (EES) and the Standard Evolutionary Synthesis (SET). Keywords: evolutionary developmental biology; evolutionary extended synthesis; theory of development 1. Introduction: The House That Charles Built Evolutionary biology, as well as science in general, is characterized by a continuous genealogy of problems, i.e., “a kind of dialectical sequence” of problems that are “linked together in a continuous family tree” [1] (p. -
A Release from Developmental Bias Accelerates Morphological Diversification in Butterfly Eyespots
A release from developmental bias accelerates morphological diversification in butterfly eyespots Oskar Brattströma,b,1,2, Kwaku Aduse-Pokua,3, Erik van Bergena,4, Vernon Frenchc, and Paul M. Brakefielda,d aDepartment of Zoology, University of Cambridge, CB2 3EJ Cambridge, United Kingdom; bAfrican Butterfly Research Institute (ABRI), 0800 Nairobi, Kenya; cInstitute of Evolutionary Biology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, EH9 3JT, United Kingdom; and dCambridge University Museum of Zoology, CB2 3EJ Cambridge, United Kingdom Edited by Sean B. Carroll, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, College Park, MD, and approved September 8, 2020 (received for review April 28, 2020) Development can bias the independent evolution of traits sharing cells releasing a signal (e.g., a diffusible morphogen) that spreads ontogenetic pathways, making certain evolutionary changes less out to form a circular concentration gradient (21, 26). The sur- likely. The eyespots commonly found on butterfly wings each have rounding cells have sensitivity thresholds that direct the color of the concentric rings of differing colors, and these serially repeated pigmented scales that are formed. Below a certain signal threshold, pattern elements have been a focus for evo–devo research. In the the cells do not respond and will continue to develop into the butterfly family Nymphalidae, eyespots have been shown to func- normal base color of the wing, effectively forming the outer edge tion in startling or deflecting predators and to be involved in sex- of the eyespot. Despite two decades of research gradually unrav- ual selection. Previous work on a model species of Mycalesina eling the genetic basis of the developmental processes of butterfly butterfly, Bicyclus anynana, has provided insights into the devel- eyespots, the exact nature of the focal signal remains unknown. -
The Structure of Evolutionary Theory: Beyond Neo-Darwinism, Neo
1 2 3 The structure of evolutionary theory: Beyond Neo-Darwinism, 4 Neo-Lamarckism and biased historical narratives about the 5 Modern Synthesis 6 7 8 9 10 Erik I. Svensson 11 12 Evolutionary Ecology Unit, Department of Biology, Lund University, SE-223 62 Lund, 13 SWEDEN 14 15 Correspondence: [email protected] 16 17 18 19 1 20 Abstract 21 The last decades have seen frequent calls for a more extended evolutionary synthesis (EES) that 22 will supposedly overcome the limitations in the current evolutionary framework with its 23 intellectual roots in the Modern Synthesis (MS). Some radical critics even want to entirely 24 abandon the current evolutionary framework, claiming that the MS (often erroneously labelled 25 “Neo-Darwinism”) is outdated, and will soon be replaced by an entirely new framework, such 26 as the Third Way of Evolution (TWE). Such criticisms are not new, but have repeatedly re- 27 surfaced every decade since the formation of the MS, and were particularly articulated by 28 developmental biologist Conrad Waddington and paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould. 29 Waddington, Gould and later critics argued that the MS was too narrowly focused on genes and 30 natural selection, and that it ignored developmental processes, epigenetics, paleontology and 31 macroevolutionary phenomena. More recent critics partly recycle these old arguments and 32 argue that non-genetic inheritance, niche construction, phenotypic plasticity and developmental 33 bias necessitate major revision of evolutionary theory. Here I discuss these supposed 34 challenges, taking a historical perspective and tracing these arguments back to Waddington and 35 Gould. I dissect the old arguments by Waddington, Gould and more recent critics that the MS 36 was excessively gene centric and became increasingly “hardened” over time and narrowly 37 focused on natural selection. -
Phenotype Bias Determines How RNA Structures Occupy the Morphospace of All Possible Shapes
bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.03.410605; this version posted December 3, 2020. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under aCC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license. Phenotype bias determines how RNA structures occupy the morphospace of all possible shapes Kamaludin Dingle1, Fatme Ghaddar1, Petr Sulcˇ 2, Ard A. Louis3 1Centre for Applied Mathematics and Bioinformatics, Department of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Gulf University for Science and Technology, Hawally 32093, Kuwait, 2School of Molecular Sciences and Center for Molecular Design and Biomimetics at the Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA 3Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3PU, United Kingdom (Dated: December 3, 2020) The relative prominence of developmental bias versus natural selection is a long standing con- troversy in evolutionary biology. Here we demonstrate quantitatively that developmental bias is the primary explanation for the occupation of the morphospace of RNA secondary structure (SS) shapes. By using the RNAshapes method to define coarse-grained SS classes, we can directly mea- sure the frequencies that non-coding RNA SS shapes appear in nature. Our main findings are, firstly, that only the most frequent structures appear in nature: The vast majority of possible struc- tures in the morphospace have not yet been explored. Secondly, and perhaps more surprisingly, these frequencies are accurately predicted by the likelihood that structures appear upon uniform random sampling of sequences. -
Development Evolution 9. Phenotypic Plasticity Phenotypic Plasticity
Development Evolution 9. Phenotypic plasticity 1. development 2. evolution The short version: 3. epigenetics 4. canalization 5. cryptic genetic variation / capacitance phenotype depends on the environment 6. genetic assimilation 7. evolvability 8. preadaptation 9. phenotypic plasticity 10. epistasis 11. modularity 12. developmental bias / constraint Phenotypic plasticity: long version Phenotypic plasticity • Gradual response to environmental gradient OR “When I use a word, it means just what I discrete switching between types choose it to mean – neither more nor less” • Fixed traits (eg size after metamorphosis) OR Humpty Dumpty labile traits (eg behavioral) • Change in the phenotypic mean (reaction norm) OR change in the phenotypic variance “When I make a word do a lot of work like that, • Response to a directional environmental shift OR I always pay it extra” response to residual environmental “noise” Humpty Dumpty • Adaptive, evolved response OR side effect of basic physiology How does phenotypic plasticity trait Spectrum adaptive tie in to other concepts? phenotypic plasticity Some contradictory (?) ideas: random preadapted • Genetic assimilation of plastic trait is loss not gain mutation cryptic variation of complexity, so genetic assimilation is irrelevant • Random variation unlikely to be adaptive to the evolution of novelty (Williams) • Very deleterious stuff weeded out • Canalization is the opposite of phenotypic • Revealed variation more likely to be adaptive plasticity (Goggy) • Trait needed briefly, then lost • Revelation of cryptic genetic variation in response • Easier to find it again in cryptic variation to stress is one kind of phenotypic plasticity • Frequent environmental switching ⇒ evolution of adaptive phenotypic plasticity (or reaction norm) • Environment stabilizes ⇒ genetic assimilation with loss of complexity 1 10. -
Downloaded from Brill.Com09/24/2021 08:16:07PM Via Free Access 210 R.A
Contributions to Zoology, 74 (1/2) 209-211 (2005) Short notes and reviews Combating footnote status in evolutionary theory Ronald A. Jenner Section of Evolution & Ecology, University of California, Davis, CA95616, USA (e-mail: rajenner@ucdavis. edu) Review of: Biased Embryos and Evolution, by empirical and theoretical information generated Wallace Arthur. Cambridge University Press, 2004, within the mushrooming discipline of evolutionary xiii + 233 pp. ISBN 0 521 54161 1 (Paperback). development biology, or, in short, evo-devo. De- pending on the reader’s background, they can then On 11 May 2004, Wallace Arthur presented a char- choose to flesh out Arthur’s conceptual framework acteristically engaging seminar at the Department with intellectually more taxing and empirically of Zoology of the University of Cambridge in or- more dense works such as Gerhart and Kirschner der to promote his new book Biased Embryos and (1997), Davidson (2001), Minelli (2003), and Wilkins Evolution. After the lecture the speaker and his au- (2002). dience adjourned to the University Museum of Zo- The core question in Arthur’s book is: what de- ology for the official launch of the book. There, termines the direction of evolutionary change? A amidst wine and canapés, the flocked friends and resounding “natural selection!” will certainly be collected colleagues were given the opportunity to the most common answer to this question from the purchase, with a considerable reduction in prize of educated layman to most professional biologists. course, the first copies of Arthur’s book, which the However, Arthur labels this expected answer as author dutifully signed in between his munching of “overly Darwinian” (p.