Tempo and Mode in Evolution: Genetics and Paleontology 50 Years After Simpson
Since George Gaylord Simpson published Tempo and Mode in Evolution in 1944, discoveries in paleontology and genetics have abounded. This volume brings together the findings and insights of today's leading experts in the study of evolution, including Ayala, W. Ford Doolittle, and Stephen Jay Gould.The volume examines early cellular evolution, explores changes in the tempo of evolution between the Precambrian and Phanerozoic periods, and reconstructs the Cambrian evolutionary burst. Long-neglected despite Darwin's interest in it, species extinction is discussed in detail.Although the absence of data kept Simpson from exploring human evolution in his book, the current volume covers morphological and genetic changes in human populations, contradicting the popular claim that all modern humans descend from a single woman.This book discusses the role of molecular clocks, the results of evolution in 12 populations of Escherichia coli propagated for 10,000 generations, a physical map of Drosophila chromosomes, and evidence for "hitchhiking" by mutations.Tempo, mode, the progenote, and the universal root / W. Ford Doolittle and James R. Brown -- Phylogeny from function : the origin of tRNA is in replication, not translation / Nancy Maizels and Alan M. Weiner -- Disparate rates, differing fates : tempo and mode of evolution changed from the Precambrian to the Phanerozoic.
