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The Evolving Peppered Moth Gains a Furry Counterpart
NY Times ^
| 6-17-03
| CAROL KAESUK YOON
Posted on 06/17/2003 7:05:07 PM PDT by Pharmboy
![](http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2003/06/17/science/17mous.184.jpg)
H. E. Hoekstra
Evolution has allowed some rock pocket mice,
pictured on light and dark rocks, to produce
distinct fur that helps disguise them.
In the deserts of the Southwest, among the towering saguaros and the spiny cholla cactuses, rock pocket mice hop and dash in search of a meal of seeds. But while these mice may seem to scamper haphazardly across the desert floor, their arrangement in nature is strikingly orderly.
Nearly everywhere these mice are sandy-colored, well camouflaged as they scurry across beige-colored outcrops. But in some areas, ancient lava flows have left behind swaths of blackened rock. There the same species of rock pocket mouse has only dark coats, having evolved an entirely distinct and, for their surroundings, equally well-disguised pelage.
Now, in a recent study in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers report identifying the gene responsible for the evolution of dark coat coloration in these mice, pinpointing the DNA sequence changes that underlie this classic story of evolutionary change, the cute and furry counterpart to the famous case of the peppered moth.
Researchers say the study is the first documentation of the genetic changes underlying an adaptive change where the evolutionary forces were natural. Scientists point out that other well-known cases involve evolution caused by humans; some have suggested that those changes may be atypical of natural evolutionary change, since they have typically involved intense, directed pressures destroying most of a population, like the spraying of pesticides or the application of antibiotics.
"This work is very important," said Dr. Mike Majerus, an evolutionary geneticist at Cambridge University, who was not part of the study. "Here man is just not involved. The sandy and lava flow substrates are entirely natural phenomena."
Other well-studied examples of human-driven adaptive change include the evolution of pesticide resistance in insects after widespread spraying and the increase in the numbers of dark-winged forms compared with light-winged forms of the peppered moth in the United States and England after industrialization turned air sooty and polluted.
Dr. Michael W. Nachman, a population geneticist, along with colleagues at the University of Arizona, Dr. Hopi E. Hoekstra and Susan L. D'Agostino, studied mice living on Arizona's Pinacate lava flow in Arizona and on light-colored rocks nearby. The researchers were able to take advantage of decades of meticulous work in which other scientists identified some 80 genes that affected coat color in laboratory mice.
On close examination, the light-colored rock pocket mice could be seen to have a type of hair coloration similar to standard, sandy-colored laboratory mice. In this pattern, known as agouti, the hair is black at the base, yellow in the middle and black again at the tip. The dark-colored rock pocket mice had completely dark hairs.
Researchers knew that mutations in a few well-known coat coloration genes in laboratory mice could cause such complete darkening of the hair, and they began by looking at two genes known as agouti and Mc1r. When they looked at DNA sequences in light and dark mice, changes in the agouti gene did not appear to be associated with light-colored fur versus dark-colored. Still, the researchers found that a certain cluster of mutations at Mc1r could be found in every dark-colored mouse.
"It's a textbook story," Dr. Nachman said. "Now we have all the pieces of the puzzle together in a natural setting."
Dr. Nachman noted that while the new study points to the Mc1r gene as the key to turning mice dark on the Pinacate lava flow, the team also found that dark mice on another lava flow in New Mexico did not share those mutations.
"So the same dark color has evolved independently in the two different populations," he said, "through different genetic solutions to the same evolutionary problem." Dr. Nachman said changes in another gene, perhaps the agouti gene, could be responsible for dark coloration in the New Mexico's Pedro Armendaris lava flow.
One could easily imagine that coloration would be of no consequence to the rock pocket mice, as they are nocturnal, darting about under the desert night sky. But researchers, working early in the last century, released light and dark mice on light and dark backgrounds in an enclosure at night and found that owls, a major predator of mice, could easily spot a mouse on a mismatched background.
Dr. Nachman noted, however, that these early researchers did not use rock pocket mice in their study, but instead used a species in which the dark and light forms were actually much less distinct.
As a result, he said, "we think the owls are discriminating even more strongly in our species." He said tiny bits of rock pocket mouse were often found in pellets at owl roosts.
Dr. Majerus said many kinds of animals showed light and dark forms, from deer mice to squirrels and chipmunks. There are even black ladybugs.
"A lot of the dark forms show an association with a particular type of substrate they're on, or the frequency of burning and charring of the trees in the woodlands," he said, noting that it would be interesting to do genetic studies in other animals, to see how many genetic solutions these other animals have come up with to turn dark.
But while many dark forms are abundant and can be studied at scientists' leisure, Dr. Majerus said that of the peppered moth was slowly disappearing.
So while there is nearly unanimous praise for the increasingly clean air in industrialized regions of the United States and Britain, there may be, at least for some scientists, a downside. "We've got about 15 or 16 years," Dr. Majerus said, "before those black forms, if they continue to disappear at the current rate, disappear completely."
TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; Miscellaneous; US: New Mexico
KEYWORDS: biology; crevolist; evolution; survival
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To: ALS
Darwin was a plagiarist. Every scientist is a plagiarist, to some degree.
121
posted on
06/19/2003 5:29:03 PM PDT
by
donh
(u)
PLACEMARKER
122
posted on
06/19/2003 5:34:05 PM PDT
by
PatrickHenry
(When rationality is outlawed, only outlaws will be rational.)
To: donh
"Every scientist is a plagiarist, to some degree."
The ol' "everybody does it" excuse again.
At least you agree he didn't ORIGINate the idea.
123
posted on
06/19/2003 7:00:23 PM PDT
by
ALS
(http://designeduniverse.conservababes.com)
To: ALS
And your religion was plagiaristic as well.
Well, since everybody does it? is that right ALS?
Christianity was NOT an original idea, whether you care to admit it or not.
It has SO many Pagan traditions built in that it is insane.
The Ol' "everybody does it" excuse again?
But since it's christianity and NOT pagan, it makes all those NASTY Pagan traditions OK? Right?
124
posted on
06/19/2003 7:45:16 PM PDT
by
Aric2000
(If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance god)
To: PatrickHenry
Raging trollish disruptor placemarker
To: the_doc
It's because a half-formed wing is useful neither for flying nor running. This is devastating to the "gradual evolutionary change" theory. Don't let any facts get in your way, doc!
![](http://www.mindspring.com/~dougkalb/Con3close.jpg)
The above is a Confuciusornis sanctus forelimb.
To: Aric2000
What's my religion, sparky?
btw - what did you say your god's name was again?
127
posted on
06/19/2003 8:04:59 PM PDT
by
ALS
(http://designeduniverse.conservababes.com)
To: jennyp
However, it is both false and irrelevant,It is not false, otherwise the phony 'scientist' that pasted them up would not have had a need to commit a fraud, he could just have photographed them any time. It is not irrelevant, because the moths are very hard to see if they perch in the branches of the trees and the coloring would not matter very much in such cases. So you are wrong on both counts.
Regardless, this is not an example of evolution, indeed it is not even an example of speciation. Both kinds of moths existed before the industrial revolution and both kinds exist after the cleanup of the smoke stacks.
128
posted on
06/19/2003 8:10:18 PM PDT
by
gore3000
(Intelligent people do not believe in evolution.)
To: jennyp
Also see this T.O. articleTalkOrigins is not a scientific journal. It is a collection of blogs of evolutionist disinformation. If all you have as proof of mutations is such faulty evidence, then it is not evidence at all.
If there was indeed a mutation which had been observed to have happened in a scientific experiment, it would have been shouted about in all the scientific journals and many other places. There are none such and that is why you are forced into resorting to such an invalid source.
129
posted on
06/19/2003 8:16:26 PM PDT
by
gore3000
(Intelligent people do not believe in evolution.)
To: ALS
You LOVE to play word games, but it so GLARINGLY obvious that it is insane, so, Don't play some coy game with me ALS.
130
posted on
06/19/2003 8:45:13 PM PDT
by
Aric2000
(If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance god)
To: gore3000
You can't be serious, speciation? what the hell?
They never claimed speciation, it was MICROEVOLUTION!!
Hello G3K, earth to G3K, hello, anybody home?
Because the pollution made the background darker, the darker Moths reproduced MORE then the Light colored moths, because they were not eaten as much.
HELLO G3K, EARTH to G3K!!!
There was NO Phony, about it, they made their point and it was a good one.
But then again, facts never get in your way, do they?
You are back on ignore, had to set the record straight on your BS again.
131
posted on
06/19/2003 8:49:37 PM PDT
by
Aric2000
(If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance god)
To: Aric2000
So your god's name is coy?
132
posted on
06/19/2003 8:57:45 PM PDT
by
ALS
(http://designeduniverse.conservababes.com)
To: ALS
No, but your's is God, as in the Jewish and Christian God, so you can quit pretending that it's NOT!!
Oh, and of course, you are back on ignore, buh bye...
133
posted on
06/19/2003 9:05:03 PM PDT
by
Aric2000
(If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance god)
To: Aric2000
looks like you don't have a problem discussing/running down someone else's God, but freak and run when yours is brought up
that's called hypocrisy
134
posted on
06/19/2003 9:30:41 PM PDT
by
ALS
(http://designeduniverse.conservababes.com)
To: ALS
No, I don't have any problem with someones elses god, I have a problem with a person that says they are Christian, is supposed to be tolerant and turns out to be one of the most bigoted persons on the board.
If you are gonna make fun of my beliefs, don't expect me to just sit there and take it, I don't turn the other cheek on intolerant bigots.
135
posted on
06/19/2003 9:46:08 PM PDT
by
Aric2000
(If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance god)
To: Aric2000
"If you are gonna make fun of my beliefs, don't expect me to just sit there and take it, I don't turn the other cheek on intolerant bigots."
my thoughts exactly
maybe you should just drop the idea of making fun of christians all together.
136
posted on
06/19/2003 9:51:35 PM PDT
by
ALS
(http://designeduniverse.conservababes.com)
To: the_doc
As a physician, I would definitely want to take my chances with malaria.Hmm-multiple drug resistance, highly lethal parasite--I sure wouldn't.
Thus, this famous argument by the evolutionists actually supports the anti-evolutionists' position--which is that mutations are deleterious...The doctrine of natural selection actually supports the creationists' case.
Mutations are harmful, neutral, or benificial. One example of a mutation that is extremely deleterious in the homozygous state, but confers resistance to malaria in the heterozygous state does not constitute proof that every mutation is harmful. Furthermore, the theory of natural selection does not, in any way, support the creationist view. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the whole basis of the creationist belief that story in Genesis? Where in Genesis, or anywhere else in the Bible, does it say anything about "microevolution" or any of the other aspects of the theory of evolution that creationists have adopted in their desperate attempt to discredit evolution? Doesn't a literal reading of the Bible lead one to expect no change, ever, if we are to literally believe the Genesis creation story?
Somehow, one species has to "jump" over the thermodynamic barrier to form a new species.
Are you talking about speciation, or enzyme kinetics?
137
posted on
06/19/2003 10:01:53 PM PDT
by
exDemMom
(PhD)
To: Pharmboy
this is a nice illustration of why Darwin was one of the nost brilliant people to ever walk the planet " .....scarcely a single point is discussed in this volume on which the facts cannot be adduced, often apparently leading to conclusions directly opposite to those at which I arrived".
[Origin of the Species: On the origin of species by means of natural selection or the preservation of favored races in the struggle for life, Charles Darwin, stupidest white man of all time]
To: Pharmboy
ABIOGENESIS
That slow process by which living organisms were spontaneously generated from non-living matter. This scientific fact should not be confused with the old discredited myth of spontaneous generation by which it was once foolishly believed that living organisms arose from non-living matter. (see Law of Biogenesis).
A.C.L.U.
An organization that zealously protects our American civil liberties by preventing students in public schools from considering scientific evidence that is either consistent with creation or critical of evolution.
BIG BANG
The mechanism, or at least the noise, by which all matter and energy came into existence billions of years ago.
BIOLOGY
The branch of the exact sciences which is exclusively concerned with the evolution of living organisms by means of random mutations and natural selection.
DROSOPHILA
The "guinea pig" of the evolutionist to which we all owe a debt of gratitude for our understanding of the role of mutations in evolution. Trillions of generations of these rapidly breeding little flies have had their wings crumpled and their eyes damaged by strong mutagenic agents to provide us with a genetic insight into how man evolved from the prehominid brutes in a few thousand generations.
EVOLUTION
A truly perfect scientific theory which explaims in detail how everything in the universe came into being -- slowly. The theory of evolutions is so perfect and flexible in its ability to explain virtually all observable phemomena or opinions that it would be impossible to even conceive of an experiment capable of disproving it. (see Law).
GEOLOGIC COLUMN
A precise hierarchy of fossilized animals and plants of known age found in successive layers of stratified rock with the simplest and oldest at the bottom and the most highly evolved, i.e., most recent, at the top. Uninterrupted columns of this type may be found in any book of geology, paleontology or evolution. Bits and pieces of the column may even be found in the stratified rocks of the earth, but since these layers are often out of correct order and very incomplete, one should study the geologic column in books, not nature.
HOPEFUL MONSTER THEORY
A concept first introduced out of necessity by the geneticist, Richard Goldschmidt, which states that evolution occurs by sudden and large changes in the offspring of a species resulting in radically different but well adapted organisms, i.e. "hopeful monsters." After being widely discredited for many years this idea is being reintroduced, out of necessity, as a serious theory. The great leaps forward implicit in this theory entirely account for the absence of the "missing links." (See Punctuated Equilibrium)
INDEX FOSSILS
Fossils of animals whose ages are precisely known from the age of the rocks in which they are found, thus, serving as a means for accurately dating the rocks in which they are found as well as the age of any other fossils that may be contained therein.
LAW
In science, a statement of fact about a sequence or phenomenon that has been invariably observed to occur under known conditions such as, for example, the theory of evolution. (see Evolution).
LAW OF BIOGENESIS
Simply states the obvious...that all life comes from pre-existing life. This law, which was confirmed by Redi and Pasteur, permanently laid to rest the ludicrous idea of the ignorant ancients that living organisms could spring from inanimate matter. It should be emphasized that this law in no way precludes the slow origin of living organisms from inanimate matter through the process of evolution - after all, we are here, aren't we? (see Abiogenesis).
LIFE
The only term in this dictionary that defies definition since it has been said that "the division of matter into living and nonliving is perhaps an arbitrary one. It is a convenient method for distinguishing, for instance, a man from a rock." (quoted verbatim from The Origins of Life, by Cyril Ponnamperuma, 1962, H. P. Dutton, New York, p. 36).
MICROSPHERES
Primitive cells which have been artificially synthesized from simple laboratory reagents. As the name implies, the principal similarity between microspheres and living cells is that both are small and sort of round.
MISSING LINKS
An inconceivably vast assemblage of plants and animals which are intermediate in their evolutionary development between all of the discrete kinds of plants and animals one sees either alive or in the fossil record. Unfortunately as the name implies they are missing.
MUTATIONS
A change in the genetic material (DNA) of the cell induced by hazardous chemicals or radiation which in addition to killing or maiming organisms will, given enough time and enough mutations, inexorably lead some organisms on to an ever more successful and adaptive life.
NATURAL SELECTION
That miraculous process by which incredibly complex and useful structures, such as the eye or brain, are culled out from a vast array of random and purposeless mutations. In the distant past this marvelous natural artificer has produced the whole scope of existence from molecules to man but today it appears to be limiting its activities to such mundane matters as controlling the relative numbers of white and black moths in England.
NEO-DARWINIAN EVOLUTION
An embellishment of the old Darwinian theory of evolution, it states that random changes (mutations) in the genome of an organism will be selected for, and thus contribute to the evolution of the new species, only if they ultimately lead to a greater number of offspring. Thus, an ever-increasing rate of reproduction entirely accounts for the evolution from bacteria to man.
ONTOGENY RECAPITULATES PHYLOGENY
A law first discovered by Ernst Haeckel which if pronounced correctly and with conviction, impresses laymen and students of science in the elementary grades. Simply stated, and thus less convincingly, it means that the embryos of all animals bother to provide a historical review of many stages of their evolution during their embryological development. Although this type of reminiscing is touching and is taught in almost every general science and biology text book, it is no longer accepted by scientists or even evolutionists.
PHYLOGENETIC TREE
A tree that grows mainly in textbooks of biology and which has a variety of both contemporary and fossil animals perched on the tips of its branches. This tree clearly shows how all of these animals branched off from common ancestors a long time ago. For some reason the common ancestors are never shown sitting in the crotches of the tree. Plants presumably grow on different trees which are rather rare.
PILTDOWN MAN
Once known by all true scholars of human evolution to be an ancient ancestor of man. This true "ape man" had the jaw of a modern ape and the skull of a modern man. Today this ape-man is not so well known among true scholars of evolution.
PRIMITIVE
Old, inferior, poorly adapted, less evolved, shoddy, bungling.
PROOF
The assimilation of data in such a way that the desired conclusion seems to be the most plausible hypothesis.
PROTOZOA
As the name implies, these are known to be the first true animals on earth. If these primitive organisms had continued to adapt to their changing environment they might still be with us today.
PUNCTUATED EQUILIBRIUM
An ad hoc hypothesis or alibi that claims the reason there are no known transitional forms in the fossil record is because evolutionary changes occur so quickly and the reason we can't see evolutionary changes in the laboratory is because they occur so slowly. (see Hopeful Monster Theory).
RADIOCARBON DATING
A remarkably precise method of actually measuring the age of any carbon-containing sample. Except for certain spurious (young) dates, radiocarbon, like other methods involving the decay of radionuclides will, given several absolutely safe assumptions, invariably indicate a ripe old age for any specimen consistent with a slow process of evolution.
SECOND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS
One of the most fundamental laws of science which essentially states that nothing can increase in order, complexity, or information but rather everything form the universe to the one-horse shay will in time fall apart (not assemble). We may be sure, however, that the mind-boggling increase in order, complexity and information accomplished by the evolution of chemicals to man in no way violates this law or it wouldn't have happened.
SELECTIVE PRESSURE
That natural and highly selective pressure that actually forces particularly useful structures such as brains, eyes, legs, wings and long necks on giraffes to evolve by random mutations. Unnecessary structures such as eyelids on your navel fail to evolve by chance because there is no selective pressure for this.
SPECULATION
The single most powerful tool in the hands of the evolutionists.
SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST
The most important contribution of Darwin to biological thought which states that only those organisms which are fit survive, or in other words, survival is the result of being fit. By this kind of logic it can also be proven that loss of vision is a principal cause of blindness.
THEISTIC EVOLUTION
The belief that the evolutionary account of origins (where everything ascends from a very imperfect state to a more nearly perfect state) and the Biblical account of origins (where everything descends from a perfect state to a very imperfect state) are both true.
TIME
That miracle ingredient which in sufficient quantity can give scientific credibility to any hypothesis no matter how improbable. It is a well- known axiom of science for example, that given enough time virtually anything is possible - indeed you might even say it has to happen.
TREE
That which only evolution can make. (see Phylogenetic Tree).
VESTIGIAL ORGANS
Organs or other body parts, left over from evolutionary ancestors, which are no longer used or needed by an organism that has become more highly evolved by abandoning organs and getting simpler. Seventy years ago man had nearly one hundred vestigial organs such as the parathyroid, tonsils, coccyx, etc., but today he has very few vestigial organs because a good use has been discovered for most of these organs.
XERDEMA PIGMENTOSA
A disease of man in which certain enzymes which normally repair mutations of DNA fail to do so resulting in malignant tumors of the skin which are often fatal. Since it is well known that mutations were essential for the evolution of man from primitive cells, we must assume that too much of even a good thing like mutations is bad for us.
To: Aric2000
Gore3000 has been told this before. Gore3000, however, continues to repeat the claim without providing any evidence for it because he is a shameless liar. Gore3000 even accused me of claiming never to have heard of the study, when really I had only claimed that I'd never heard of the study being used as speciation. Gore3000 has never apologized for falsely accusing me of lying, because gore3000 is a coward and a liar.
140
posted on
06/19/2003 11:24:08 PM PDT
by
Dimensio
(Sometimes I doubt your committment to Sparkle Motion!)
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