Phenotypic Integration Studying the Ecology and Evolution of Complex Phenotypes

About this book

A new voice in the nature - nurture debate can be heard at the interface between evolution and development. Phenotypic integration - or, how large numbers of characteristics are related to make up the whole organism, and how these relationships evolve and change their function - is a major growth area in research, attracting the attention of evolutionary biologists, developmental biologists, and geneticists, as well as, more broadly, ecologists, physiologists, and paleontologists. This edited collection presents much of the best and most recent work on the topic.

Contents

Foreword: The diversity of complexity; Phenotypic Integration: Studying the Ecology and Evolution of Complex Phenotypes; SECTION I: ADAPTATION AND CONSTRAINTS; 1. Floral integration, modularity, and accuracy: distinguishing complex adaptations from genetic constraints; 2. Integration and modularity in the evolution of sexual ornaments: An overlooked perspective; 3. the Evolution of allometry in modular organisms; 4. Phenotypic integration as a constraint and adaptation; 5. Evolvability, stabilizing selection, and the problem of stasis; SECTION II: PHENOTYPIC PLASTICITY AND INTEGRATION; 6. Studying the plasticity of phenotypic integration in a model organism; 7. Integrating phenotypic plasticity when death is on the line: Insights from predator-prey systems; SECTION III: GENETICS AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY OF PHENOTYPIC INTEGRATION; 8. QTL Mapping: a first step towards an understanding of molecular genetic mechanisms behind phenotypic complexity/integration; 9. Integration, modules, and development: molecules to morphology to evolution; 10. Studying mutational effects on G-matrices; SECTION IV: MACROEVOLUTIONARY PATTERNS IN PHENOTYPIC INTEGRATION; 11. the Macroevolution of phenotypic integration; 12. Form, Function and Life-History: Spatial and Temporal Dynamics of Integration; 13. Morphological Integration in Primate Evolution; SECTION V: THEORY AND ANALYSIS OF PHENOTYPIC INTEGRATION; 14. Phylogenetic comparative analysis of multivariate data; 15. The Evolution of genetic architecture; 16. Multivariate phenotypic evolution in developmental hyperspace; 17. the Relativism of constraints on phenotypic evolution; 18. The Developmental Systems Perspective: Organism-environment systems as units of development and evolution; Conclusion

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