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Invasive species seem to increase local (alpha diversity) diversity, which decreases turnover of diversity (beta diversity). Overall gamma diversity may be lowered because species are going extinct because of other causes, [ 194 ] but even some of the most insidious invaders (e.g.: Dutch elm disease, emerald ash borer, chestnut blight in North ...
The basic mechanisms of evolution are applied directly or indirectly to come up with novel designs or solve problems that are difficult to solve otherwise. The research generated in these applied fields, contribute towards progress, especially from work on evolution in computer science and engineering fields such as mechanical engineering. [6]
In biology, evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organization, from kingdoms to species, and individual organisms and molecules, such as DNA and proteins.
The main subfields of evolutionary ecology are life history evolution, sociobiology (the evolution of social behavior), the evolution of interspecific interactions (e.g. cooperation, predator–prey interactions, parasitism, mutualism) and the evolution of biodiversity and of ecological communities.
The result of four billion years of evolution is the diversity of life around us, with an estimated 1.75 million different species in existence today. [ 71 ] [ 72 ] Usually the process of speciation is slow, occurring over very long time spans; thus direct observations within human life-spans are rare.
This forms an important part of the evidence on which evolutionary theory rests, demonstrates that evolution does occur, and illustrates the processes that created Earth's biodiversity. It supports the modern evolutionary synthesis —the current scientific theory that explains how and why life changes over time.
Evolution is the change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. [1] [2] It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, resulting in certain characteristics becoming more or less common within a population over successive generations. [3]
Mosaic evolution – Evolution of characters at various rates both within and between species; Parallel evolution – Similar evolution in distinct species; Quantum evolution – Evolution where transitional forms are particularly unstable and do not last long; Recurrent evolution – The repeated evolution of a particular character