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| Syllabus | Lecture notes | Reports | Exams | Grades |
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Instructor: Richard E. Strauss, Biology 508
Lecture: 8:00-9:50 M-F, Biology 106
Office hours: 10-11 M-F, or by appointment
A central unifying concept of biology is that the diversity of life on Earth is the outcome of evolution: a natural and unpredictable process of temporal descent with genetic modification that is affected by natural selection, chance, historical contingencies, and changing environments. The concept of organic evolution has affected almost all other fields of knowledge and is considered to be one of the most influential concepts in Western thought. This course concerns the patterns, principles and processes of evolution and how they relate to ecology, physiology, behavior, morphology, and the systematics and classification of organisms.
This course is required for all Biology majors except those in Cell & Molecular Biology, for which the course is an elective. In addition, it is a general science elective. The course will introduce students to the basic principles of modern evolutionary biology, both to the theory and its predictions and to the data and observations underlying the theory. It will first provide a general introduction to the nature and organization of genetic variation in populations. We will then consider how this genetic variation is expressed and filtered in natural populations to produce evolutionary change. . The final portion of the course will concern the origins and historical patterns of biodiversity and the study of phylogenetic relationships. By the end of the course, students should be able to understand the basic concepts of evolutionary biology and its importance in the biological and medical sciences, and be equipped to use these principles to inform their understanding of sociological issues associated with public perceptions of evolutionary biology and its ramifications. Learning will be assessed through in-class examinations, non-graded quizzes, a short report, and a term paper.
One semester of genetics (BIOL 3416) or its equivalent.
Futuyma, D.J. 2005. Evolution. Sinauer Associates, 603 p. ISBN 0-87893-187-2.
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