Evolution in Daily Life

This page was started on 14 January 2003. It is devoted to items in the news that show the relevance of evolution and natural selection to daily life. This page makes no pretense to be comprehensive. If you know of a news item that might be featured here, your input is welcome. Please click here to send details.

Two topics that this page does not attempt to cover are already well covered by others: (1) Creationism and its ilk. See the National Center for Science Education; and (2) Recent developments in evolutionary biology generally. See Nature Science Update, Science Daily, or Evolution Update.

Rather, this page contains links to recent items in the popular press (or occasionally in scientific journals) that show evolution and natural selection in action in daily life.

07 September 2003. Just When You Thought It Was Safe To Wash Your Hands Don't be so quick to use that antibacterial soap. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

03 August 2003. Artificially Evolved Protein Destroys Nerve Gas Researchers at Texas A&M have used directed evolution to modify a common bacterial enzyme so that it pulls apart a lethal nerve agent.

14 July 2003. A Theory of the Human Life Cycle A new theory of aging, an extension of William Hamilton's "grandmother effect" theory, explains why humans are long-lived, why infant mortality is highest in the early years, and perhaps even why parents pay so much to send their children to college. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

19 June 2003. Are men and women as different as humans and chimps? A new study of the Y chromosome suggests that the genetic differences between men and women may be as great as that between humans and chimpanzees. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

13 June 2003. Origin of AIDS traced back another step. Four years ago researchers proposed that AIDS may have begun when humans ate chimpanzees infected with an ancestor virus. A new study by the same group suggests that chimpanzees may have acquired the virus by eating bushmeat too -- monkeys. It is hypothesized that the chimpanzee virus was derived from two different monkey viruses from two different monkey species. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

27 April 2003. Heat Could Flip Sex Switch. There is speculation that testes might be outside the body because temperature influences the sex of human children.

27 April 2003. Cannibal Ancestry Marked in Human Genes. A new study suggests that our chromosomes give evidence that our ancestors were cannibals.

27 April 2003. Doctors Prescribing Fewer Unnecessary Antibiotics. Still more in the ongoing story of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

23 March 2003. Body's Own Antibodies May Drive New Strains Of HIV. Neutralizing antibodies attempting to combat HIV infection may provide strong selective pressure for the virus to stay one step ahead of the immune system. HIV thus becomes a moving target that the immune system never quite catches.

23 March 2003. Mayo Clinic Researchers Teach RNA to Act as Decoy Inside Living Cell to Prevent Disease Activation. An accelerated laboratory version of natural selection has been used to develop RNA molecules that may have therapeutic potential.

23 March 2003. Study of monkey species that fights off AIDS may lead to new treatments for humans. Mangabey monkeys do not become ill when infected with simian immunodeficiency virus. The reason why, which is intringuing, could potentially lead to AIDS treatments for humans.

15 March 2003. Humans place selective pressure on marine snails. The average size of marine snails and limpets along the Southern California coast has declined significantly over the past century, and collection by humans appears to be the culprit, according to a study led by biologists at the University of California, San Diego.

15 March 2003. Antibiotic Resistance More developments on the antibiotic resistance front.

06 March 2003. The Founder Effect in Human Populations The founder effect has been implicated in some genetic diseases that are disproportionately common in certain human groups.(Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

02 March 2003. Obesity in the Genes? Some hypothesize that genes that promoted survival in humanity's ancestral savvanah may predispose some individuals to obesity in our food-rich, modern civilization.

02 March 2003. 50th Anniversary of the Discovery of the Double Helix A special section in the New York Times on the 50th anniversary of Watson and Crick's discovery.(Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

02 March 2003. Insect Resistant Corn EPA has approved Monsanto's release of BT corn, to combat the corn rootworm. EPA is requiring that farmers plant 20% of their fields with non-resistant corn, to reduce selective pressure for BT-resistant rootworms to develop. Will farmers comply? Is 20% sufficient? Time will tell. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

02 March 2003. Alzheimer's-Like Mutation in Flies A mutation in fruit flies has been identified that causes symptoms similar to those of Alzheimer's Disease. The mutation is being studied in the hope that it may lead to insights into the human disease. Flies and humans are not that different under the skin, due to their common ancestry.

19 February 2003. The Blank Slate A review of Steven Pinker's book The Blank Slate.

19 February 2003. Antibiotic Resistance Bacteria developing antibiotic resistance isn't exactly the latest news, but it's still going on, and it's a clear example of selective pressure in action.

19 February 2003. Artificial Selection in Humans? Natural selection is not the only force affecting human evolution. At least to a limited extent, artificial selection is being practiced by some. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

2 February 2003. Why Menopause? Few organisms live much past than their effective reproductive years. Why do humans? Perhaps grandmothers, particularly maternal grandmothers, help pass their genes to future generations by assisting mothers raise children. See also this related article.

28 January 2003. Why is Childbirth Painful? Some are rethinking the "traditional" answer to this question. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.)

21 January 2003. Obesity in Worms Researchers have identified some 400 genes in the worm C. elegans that increase or decrease the level of fat deposits in the worm. The long-term goal of such research is to develop treatment for obesity in humans. The reason, of course, that human genes and worm genes share enough similarity that such a goal is realistic is that those genes are inherited from a common ancestor. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.) See also related articles from Scientific American and Massachusetts General Hospital.

21 January 2003. Evolving Inventions "Genetic programming" evolves computer code through principles analogous to natural selection. Genetic programming has been used to make inventions that some say could even be patentable. Several electrical circuits that perform useful tasks have been designed through genetic programming. Some of these circuits are said to perform better than human-designed counterparts. The design of some of the circuits can be baffling to humans attempting to understand them. But the proof of the pudding is that they work. (Abstract available for free at Scientific American website. The complete article is available for purchase.) See also the related websites of Genetic Programming Inc. and Genetic-Programming.Org.

14 January 2003. Roundup Ready Weeds After nearly thirty years, weeds are beginning to develop resistance to one of the most popular agricultural (and suburban) herbicides, one that is usually considered to be relatively benign due to its short halflife in the environment -- Roundup (glyphosate). The culprit is not outcrossing from genetically-engineered "Roundup Ready" crops into weedy relatives, as some have feared, but just plain, old-fashioned selective pressure. (Free registration is required at the New York Times website. The Times generally charges for access to articles more than 7 days old.) See also this 22 February 2003 New York Times editorial

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This page last updated on 07 September 2003
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