Evolution and the avian flu - updated July 2009
The warnings are dire. The economic cost for developed countries alone is estimated at 550 billion dollars, and the projected worldwide death toll ranges between 2 million and 150 million people. The very real specter behind these warnings is, of course, avian flu. As the virus spreads through bird populations, governments have heeded the warnings of health officials and begun to cull infected flocks. More than 150 million birds have been killed so far...
Phylogenetic systematics, a.k.a. evolutionary trees
All life on Earth is united by evolutionary history; we are all evolutionary cousins twigs on the tree of life. Phylogenetic systematics is the formal name for the field within biology that reconstructs evolutionary history and studies the patterns of relationships among organisms.
DNA and mutations
Mutations are the ultimate source of genetic variation and are therefore, essential to evolution. Learn more about the causes, effects, and types of mutations, as well as their role in evolution.
This site was created by the University of California Museum of Paleontology with support provided by the National Science Foundation (grant no. 0096613) and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (grant no. 51003439).