EVOLUTION

Catalog description

Every area of biological investigation, from the study of biodiversity and consequences of environmental change to the origin and diversification of protein coding genes and variation in developmental processes, is informed by the principles of evolutionary biology. The field of evolutionary biology is one of the most dynamic areas in biology with application to understanding disease dynamics, human biology, agriculture, and the conservation of biological diversity. The study of evolution encompasses both the description and analysis of historical patterns in the biological diversity of life as well as the conceptual and mathematical frameworks that describes the processes causing evolutionary change through time. In this course, we develop the basic mathematical frameworks for population and quantitative genetics and examine evolution at the molecular and phenotypic levels. Throughout the course we draw extensively from the primary literature to illustrate the amazing diversity of life around us and the evolutionary processes that have shaped this diversity over hundreds of millions of years. There will be approximately 3 hours of lecture and 1 hour of literature review per week. Prerequisite: BIOL-341 or instructor's consent.