7. The Importance of Development in Evolution
Edward P. Bass Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
This lecture examines the role of developmental processes in shaping the complexity and diversity of multicellular organisms. It discusses the genetic control of development, highlighting the significance of ancient, conserved structures and combinatorial gene expression, including the function of transcription factors.
Principles of Evolution, Ecology and Behavior (EEB 122)
Development is responsible for the complexity of multicellular organisms. It helps to map the genotype into the phenotype expressed by the organism. Development is responsible for ancient patterns among related organisms, and many structures important to development shared by many life forms have changed little over hundreds of millions of years. Development is expressed combinatorially, allowing a relatively small amount of genetic information to be expressed in many different ways.
6. The Origin and Maintenance of Genetic Variation
Next · Lecture 8Lecture 8: The Expression of Variation: Reaction Norms (EEB 122)