Evolvability in the fossil record
(2022) In Paleobiology 48(2). p.186-209- Abstract
The concept of evolvability - the capacity of a population to produce and maintain evolutionarily relevant variation - has become increasingly prominent in evolutionary biology. Paleontology has a long history of investigating questions of evolvability, but paleontological thinking has tended to neglect recent discussions, because many tools used in the current evolvability literature are challenging to apply to the fossil record. The fundamental difficulty is how to disentangle whether the causes of evolutionary patterns arise from variational properties of traits or lineages rather than being due to selection and ecological success. Despite these obstacles, the fossil record offers unique and growing sources of data that capture... (More)
The concept of evolvability - the capacity of a population to produce and maintain evolutionarily relevant variation - has become increasingly prominent in evolutionary biology. Paleontology has a long history of investigating questions of evolvability, but paleontological thinking has tended to neglect recent discussions, because many tools used in the current evolvability literature are challenging to apply to the fossil record. The fundamental difficulty is how to disentangle whether the causes of evolutionary patterns arise from variational properties of traits or lineages rather than being due to selection and ecological success. Despite these obstacles, the fossil record offers unique and growing sources of data that capture evolutionary patterns of sustained duration and significance otherwise inaccessible to evolutionary biologists. Additionally, there exist a variety of strategic possibilities for combining prominent neontological approaches to evolvability with those from paleontology. We illustrate three of these possibilities with quantitative genetics, evolutionary developmental biology, and phylogenetic models of macroevolution. In conclusion, we provide a methodological schema that focuses on the conceptualization, measurement, and testing of hypotheses to motivate and provide guidance for future empirical and theoretical studies of evolvability in the fossil record.
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- author
- Love, Alan C. ; Grabowski, Mark ; Houle, David ; Liow, Lee Hsiang ; Porto, Arthur ; Tsuboi, Masahito LU ; Voje, Kjetil L. and Hunt, Gene
- organization
- publishing date
- 2022
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- in
- Paleobiology
- volume
- 48
- issue
- 2
- pages
- 186 - 209
- publisher
- Paleontological Soc Inc
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85119340989
- ISSN
- 0094-8373
- DOI
- 10.1017/pab.2021.36
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- additional info
- Publisher Copyright: © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Paleontological Society.
- id
- e0132694-5175-4446-81cf-b053c497b79e
- date added to LUP
- 2021-12-21 08:50:39
- date last changed
- 2024-05-04 19:14:08
@article{e0132694-5175-4446-81cf-b053c497b79e,
abstract = {{<p>The concept of evolvability - the capacity of a population to produce and maintain evolutionarily relevant variation - has become increasingly prominent in evolutionary biology. Paleontology has a long history of investigating questions of evolvability, but paleontological thinking has tended to neglect recent discussions, because many tools used in the current evolvability literature are challenging to apply to the fossil record. The fundamental difficulty is how to disentangle whether the causes of evolutionary patterns arise from variational properties of traits or lineages rather than being due to selection and ecological success. Despite these obstacles, the fossil record offers unique and growing sources of data that capture evolutionary patterns of sustained duration and significance otherwise inaccessible to evolutionary biologists. Additionally, there exist a variety of strategic possibilities for combining prominent neontological approaches to evolvability with those from paleontology. We illustrate three of these possibilities with quantitative genetics, evolutionary developmental biology, and phylogenetic models of macroevolution. In conclusion, we provide a methodological schema that focuses on the conceptualization, measurement, and testing of hypotheses to motivate and provide guidance for future empirical and theoretical studies of evolvability in the fossil record. </p>}},
author = {{Love, Alan C. and Grabowski, Mark and Houle, David and Liow, Lee Hsiang and Porto, Arthur and Tsuboi, Masahito and Voje, Kjetil L. and Hunt, Gene}},
issn = {{0094-8373}},
language = {{eng}},
number = {{2}},
pages = {{186--209}},
publisher = {{Paleontological Soc Inc}},
series = {{Paleobiology}},
title = {{Evolvability in the fossil record}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/pab.2021.36}},
doi = {{10.1017/pab.2021.36}},
volume = {{48}},
year = {{2022}},
}