Telling the Evolutionary Time: Molecular Clocks and the Fossil Record

by Donoghue; Philip C J

• ISBN13: 9780415275248
• ISBN10: 0415275245
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-12-16
• Publisher: CRC Press

Summary

Determining the precise timing for the evolutionary origin of groups of organisms has become increasingly important as scientists from diverse disciplines attempt to examine rates of anatomical or molecular evolution and correlate intrinsic biological events to extrinsic environmental events. Molecular clock analyses indicate that many major groups are twice as old, or more, than a literal reading of the fossil record attests, implying that the fossil record is incomplete. Few paleontologists agree that the fossil record is inadequate, arguing instead that our understanding of the molecular clock is far from ideal.Telling the Evolutionary Time: Molecular Clocks and the Fossil Record represents a discussion between molecular biologists and paleontologists, in which they investigate the significance of competing sources of data, explain the nature of molecular clocks and the fossil record, and strive to develop compromise models that incorporate contradictory opinions. These are presented as a series of case studies dealing with many of the most important groups of complex organisms, such as protists, land plants, flowering plants, complex animals, chordates, vertebrates, tetrapods, and modern birds.Bringing fresh insight and various perspectives to a complicated argument, this book assembles all sides of the debate into one comprehensive text. It is a significant volume for research scientists and advanced students across the field of evolutionary biology.

Table of Contents

Contributors	vii
Introduction: molecular clocks and the fossil record-towards consilience?	1	(4)
Philip C.J. Donoghue
M. Paul Smith
Molecular clocks: whence and whither?	5	(22)
Francisco Rodriguez-Trelles
Rosa Tarrio
Francisco J. Ayala
Molecular clocks and a biological trigger for Neoproterozoic Snowball Earth events and the Cambrian explosion	27	(14)
S. Blair Hedges
Phylogenetic fuse and evolutionary `explosions':confliction evidence and critical tests	41	(25)
Richard A. Fortey
Jennifer Jackson
Jan Strugnell
The quality of the fossil record	66	(25)
Michael J. Benton
Ghost ranges	91	(16)
Christopher R.C. Paul
Episodic evolution of nuclear small subunit ribosomal RNA gene in the stem-lineage of Foraminifera	107	(12)
Jan Pawlowski
Cedric Berney
Dating the origin of land plants	119	(23)
Charles H. Wellman
Angiosperm divergence times: congruence and incongruence between fossils and sequence divergence estimates	142	(24)
Niklas Wikstrom
Vincent Savolainen
Mark W. Chase
The limitation of the fossil record and the dating of the origin of the Bilateria	166	(24)
Graham E. Budd
Soren Jensen
The origin and early evolution of chordates: molecular clocks and the fossil record	190	(34)
Philip C.J. Donoghue
M. Paul Smith
Ivan J. Sansom
Bones, molecules, and crown-tetrapod origins	224	(39)
Marcello Ruta
Michael I. Coates
The fossil record and molecular clocks: basal radiations within the Neornithes	263	(16)
Gareth J. Dyke
Systematics Association Publications	279	(4)
Index	283