Tag Archives: Evolution 101

Evolution 101: Synthetic Biology

This week’s Evolution 101 blog post is by UW graduate student Bryan Bartley. Synthetic biology is a new frontier in biological research where scientists and engineers are creating living systems out of molecular chemistry.  In the last half century, the … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Fitness Landscapes

This week’s Evolution 101 blog post is by MSU postdoc Arend Hintze and MSU graduate student Randy Olson. While fitness landscapes are generally thought to be more of a theoretical construct, they are in fact quite tangible and underly every … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Natural Selection

This week’s Evolution 101 post is by an interdisciplinary group of BEACONites, all of whom rely on the principles of natural selection in their research: MSU graduate student Nikki Cavalieri (Zoology), MSU postdoc Prakarn Unachak (Evolutionary Computation), and NC A&T … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Host-Parasite Interactions: Of Mice and Cheese and Men and Zombies

This week’s Evolution 101 Post is by MSU graduate student Alita Burmeister. Hollywood loves a good parasite story—from zombies and vampires to Alien and Star Trek II — nothing creeps audiences out like a parasitic infection that controls its host’s … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Epistasis

This week’s Evolution 101 post is by MSU postdoc Bjørn Østman. Bjørn also blogs at Pleiotropy. What is epistasis? Epistasis is a measure of the strength of epistatic interactions. Epistatic interactions are non-additive interactions between alleles, loci, or mutations. That is, … Continue reading

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Eco-Evolutionary Dynamics

This week’s Evolution 101 blog post is by MSU graduate student Byron Smith. Evolution is often thought of as a constant, gradual change in the characteristics of a species based on how well those traits are adapted to a static … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Maternal Effects

This week’s Evolution 101 blog post is by MSU graduate student Emily Weigel. This is a moment to thank your mom. Mothers have more of an effect on their offspring than one might first think. In addition to the DNA, … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Adaptive Dynamics Models and Game Theory

This week’s Evolution 101 blog post is by MSU undergrad Faisal Tameesh and MSU grad student Emily Weigel.  Mathematics developed from game theory has been used to study phenotypic evolution, or evolution in the way something “appears” or “behaves.” Particular … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Kin Selection

This week’s Evolution 101 blog post is by MSU graduate student Sara Garnett. As soon as spadefoot toad tadpoles are born, the pressure’s on. Adults lay their eggs in temporary ponds, created from sudden rainstorms in the southwestern desert. Because … Continue reading

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Evolution 101: Neuroevolution

This week we introduce a new occasional blog series: Evolution 101. Enjoy! If you were to ask a random person what the best example of Artificial Intelligence is out there, what do you think it would be? Most likely, it … Continue reading

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