English naturalist Charles Darwin developed the idea of natural selection after a five-year voyage to study plants, animals, and fossils in South America and on islands in the Pacific. In 1859, he brought the idea of natural selection to the attention of the world in his best-selling book, On the Origin of Species.
Natural selection is the process through which populations of living organisms adapt and change. Individuals in a population are naturally variable, meaning that they are all different in some ways. This variation means that some individuals have traits better suited to the environment than others. Individuals with adaptive traits—traits that give them some advantage—are more likely to survive and reproduce. These individuals then pass the adaptive traits on to their offspring. Over time, these advantageous traits become more common in the population. Through this process of natural selection, favorable traits are transmitted through generations.
Natural selection can lead to speciation, where one species gives rise to a new and distinctly different species. It is one of the processes that drives evolution and helps to explain the diversity of life on Earth.
Darwin chose the name natural selection to contrast with “artificial selection,” or selective breeding that is controlled by humans. He pointed to the pastime of pigeon breeding, a popular hobby in his day, as an example of artificial selection. By choosing which pigeons mated with others, hobbyists created distinct pigeon breeds, with fancy feathers or acrobatic flight, that were different from wild pigeons.
Darwin and other scientists of his day argued that a process much like artificial selection happened in nature, without any human intervention. He argued that natural selection explained how a wide variety of life forms developed over time from a single common ancestor.
Darwin did not know that genes existed, but he could see that many traits are heritable—passed from parents to offspring.
Mutations are changes in the structure of the molecules that make up genes, called DNA. The mutation of genes is an important source of genetic variation within a population. Mutations can be random (for example, when replicating cells make an error while copying DNA), or happen as a result of exposure to something in the environment, like harmful chemicals or radiation.
Mutations can be harmful, neutral, or sometimes helpful, resulting in a new, advantageous trait. When mutations occur in germ cells (eggs and sperm), they can be passed on to offspring.
If the environment changes rapidly, some species may not be able to adapt fast enough through natural selection. Through studying the fossil record, we know that many of the organisms that once lived on Earth are now extinct. Dinosaurs are one example. An invasive species, a disease organism, a catastrophic environmental change, or a highly successful predator can all contribute to the extinction of species.
Today, human actions such as overhunting and the destruction of habitats are the main cause of extinctions. Extinctions seem to be occurring at a much faster rate today than they did in the past, as shown in the fossil record.
| What It Means to Evolve | ||
| 1. How can one species "turn into" another? | ||
| One species does not "turn into" another or several other species -- not in an instant, anyway. The evolutionary process of speciation is how one population of a species changes over time to the point where that population is distinct and can no longer interbreed with the "parent" population. In order for one population to diverge enough from another to become a new species, there needs to be something to keep the populations from mixing. Often a physical boundary divides the species
into two (or more) populations and keeps them from interbreeding. If separated for long enough and presented with sufficiently varied environmental conditions, each population takes its own distinct evolutionary path. Sometimes the division between the populations is never breached, and reproductive isolation remains intact purely for geographical reasons. It is possible, though, if the populations have been separate for long enough, that even if brought back together and given the opportunity
to interbreed they won't, or they won't be successful if they try. | ||
| 2. How can evolution produce complex organs like the eye? | ||
| In the process of natural selection, individuals in a population who are well-adapted to a particular set of environmental conditions have an advantage over those who are not so well adapted. These individuals pass their genes and advantageous traits to their offspring, giving the offspring the same advantages. Generation after generation, natural selection acts upon each structure within an organ like the eye, producing incremental improvements in the process. Each tiny change in a
structure is dependent upon changes in all the other structures. In this way, individual parts of a system evolve in unison to be both structurally and functionally compatible. Eventually, over thousands and sometimes millions of years, the small improvements add up -- the simple, systematic process has produced an almost unfathomably complex organ. Recently, scientists have found clues to the evolutionary pasts of some of the most complex organs, helping to clarify how this process works. | ||
| 3. Does evolution stop once a species has become a species? | ||
| Evolution does not stop once a species becomes a species. Every population of living organisms is undergoing some sort of evolution, though the degree and speed of the process varies greatly from one group to another. Populations that experience a major change in environmental conditions, whether that change comes in the form of a new predator or a new island to disperse to, evolve much more quickly than do populations in a more stable set of conditions. This is because evolution is
driven by natural selection, and because when the environment changes, selective pressures change, favoring one portion of the population more heavily than it was favored before the change. | ||
| 4. Is evolution happening now? | ||
| Evolution is always happening, though often at rates far too slow to be observed in a matter of days, weeks, or even years. The effects of evolution can be felt in almost every aspect of our daily lives, though, from medical and agricultural dilemmas to the process of choosing a good mate. In medicine, there's the question of how long the antibiotics we take now will remain effective, given the relatively fast rate at which bacteria can evolve resistance to drugs. In agriculture, the
need to protect this year's crops is pitted against the concern that doing so will set the stage for insects to evolve pesticide resistance. For all of us, there is the issue of decreasing biodiversity, as most scientists believe that life on Earth is currently undergoing a mass extinction in which 50 percent or more of species will die out. These are just a few examples of ways in which evolutionary processes affect our daily lives. | ||