Age and size at maturity are key life-history traits in a fish stock. At the individual level, age and size at maturity affect fecundity, growth and survival. At the population level these factors interact to affect the age and size distribution, the population dynamics and the productivity of the stock....
Age and size at maturity are key life-history traits in a fish stock. At the individual level age and size at maturity affect fecundity, growth and survival. At the population level these factors interact to affect age and size distribution, the population dynamics and the productivity of the stock. A...
Kelso's theory of Biocultural Evolution states that as culture evolves, the variation between groups diminishes while the variation within groups increases. The theory is tested with stature, cephalic index and nasal index. Means and standard deviations for these traits are examined for 237 ethnic groups. The groups are organized according...
Determination of the Vertebrate pedigree was a
particularly enigmatic problem for evolutionary morphologists
of the early post-Darwinian period. At that time,
practically no characteristics were known by which the
Vertebrates could be linked to any of the other animal
groups. Up to the 1850's, most research in embryology
and anatomy...
In social and biological evolution, infelicity can operate as a driving
motor to force change. In this essay, for life other than human, infelicity is
equated with physical unfitness to compete for the resources of a specific
niche. For humanity it is defined as the result of an incongruity between...
Caenorhabditis elegans is arguably the best understood animal on the planet.
Used for over 50 years to study development, we have a vast amount of knowledge of
the inner workings of this worm. Our knowledge is incomplete, however, without
placing this organism in its evolutionary and ecological context. In this...
The evolutionary relationship between Frankia and actinorhizal plants was evaluated
by reconstructing molecular phylogenetic trees from nifH, 16S rDNA, and rbcL
nucleotide sequences. Subgroupings in Frankia phylogenetic trees reconstructed from
nifH and from 16S rDNA sequences were consistent in terms of plant origins of Frankia
strains. Although the branching order...
Rhizopogon vesiculosus is a common ectomycorrhizal (EM) symbiont of Pseudotusga menziesii (Douglas-fir) in the coast range of the Pacific Northwest. The species has been studied for its systematics, genet size, population structure, and competitive ability in several field and experimental studies. This thesis seeks to provide a more thorough characterization...
Hypotheses of phylogenetic and historical zoogeographic relationships of glyptocephalines (Glyptocephalus cynoglossus, G. zachirus, G. stelleri, Microstomus kitt, H. pacificus, H. achne,
Embassichthys bathybius, and Tanakius kitaharae) were constructed based on comparative anatomy and external morphology. The phylogenetic approach was cladistic and character polarity was
determined by using out-group comparison. One...
Eukaryotic small RNA (~20-30 nucleotides) are diverse regulatory molecules that repress gene expression at the transcriptional and post-transcriptional levels, defend hosts against invading viruses and defend genomes against selfish DNA elements. Small RNA populations are studied by high-throughput sequencing of the total small RNA fraction isolated from cells, however, the...