It's a bit like a character in a movie going off and having adventures that change him so drastically that when he returns, the folks in his hometown no longer recognize the way he looks and behaves.

A genetic study of island lizards shows that even those that have been geographically isolated for many millions of years have not evolved into separate species as predicted by conventional ...

New evidence uncovered by oceanographers challenges one of the most long-standing theories about how species evolve in the oceans. Researchers propose that it was the climate, and its role in ...

This article addresses central themes in the study of tropical biodiversity, exploring the roles that speciation, extinction, and dispersal play in the formation of regional assemblages. The ...

Trait data from more than 1,000 different vertebrate species suggests that new species often arise not because of pressures from different environments, but because of prolonged geographic separation ...

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American This is a repost from April 24 th, 2010.

There are thousands of species of moths and butterflies, to the delight of lepidopterists everywhere. The most popular explanation for their exuberant diversity is coevolution: as plants evolve ...

Researchers from the field of natural sciences, find spectroscopy as an important investigatory tool. In fact, spectral analysis is extensively used by evolutionary researchers, geologists, climate ...