Category Archives: Evolution

The Bering land bridge plays a central role in our picture of how humans reached the Americas. When much more of the worlds water was locked up in ice, and the land between Asia and North America was exposed, people followedthe bridge to migrate out of Asia, into Alaska, and from there into the rest of the Americas.

This picture tends to portray thebridge as purely a route to the new continents. In fact, the word bridge definitely conjures up the wrong image. It was a geographic region, often called Beringia, and people lived there for so long that it probably would have been ludicrous to them that we could think of their homeas transient. Current estimates suggest that people lived there for between 5,000 and 8,000years, starting about23,000 years ago.

That is a long enough time for natural selection to have had an effect on the genome of people who lived there, according to a paper in PNAS this week. The Beringians would have faced distinctdiseases, food constraints, and climate conditions, and natural selection would have helped those with the right genetic adaptationsto thrive in that environment. According to the new paper, we can see evidence of that natural selection in modern Native American populations.

Recently, a genetic survey of 191 Greenlandic Inuit people found some genetic patterns that are so common that the best explanation for them is natural selection. Specifically, theres evidence to suggest that three genes involved in metabolizing fatty acids (called the fatty acid desaturases, or FADS, genes) show changes that might be the result of adaptation to a diet high in protein and fats.That sort of diettends to be one of the side-effects of living in the Arctic.

But these conditions arent really particular toGreenland; they were probably similar in Beringia. It's possiblethat the adaptations tookplace on Beringia itselfin which case they would predate the peopling of all the Americas.

To test this hypothesis, a group of researchers compared the genomes of Native Americans to people from Africa, Europe, and East Asia. In line with earlier evidence, they found variants in the FADS genes that were much more common in the Native American genomes. This is true even though diets among Native American populations became quite diverse over their history.

Theres a growing pile of evidence that the FADS genes are pretty important, says Rasmus Nielsen, who wasnt involved with this paper, but was one of the authors on the paper about the Greenlandic Inuit genome. The same genes seem to show signs of natural selection in lots of different human populations, and it all seems to have something to do with the histories of what those populations have eaten. These are genes that seem to be really, really important when the diet changes, he says.

One tricky thing is that natural selection isnt the only thing that brings about differences between genomes. When you have a large population of people, they have quite a bit of variation in their genomesfor instance, apopulation might have some people with brown eyes, some with green, and some with blue.

If a small part of this group breaks away and moves off, they take only part of that total variation with them. Because of random chance, 80 percent of that group of migrants might have brown eyes. If their descendants tend to have brown eyes, that doesnt mean that natural selection made it that way.

So, if Native American genomes tend to show a lot of differences on the FADS genes, its important to check that the result isnt because of this founder effect. Testing this means looking at the rest of the genome, estimating how strong the founder effect is, and seeing whether the variants in question are more common than you would expect based on afounder effect. When the researchers did this, they found a number of variants that were common enough that natural selection seemed like the best explanation.

Beringia was inhabited by a population, not individuals. So, as you might imagine, not all of the Native American genomes were uniform in terms of which FADS variants they had. Some regions showed more of the variants, and some showed less. The high frequencies occur despite marked differences in lifestyles and diets of the different indigenous populations, the authors write. However, there hasnt been a huge amount of time for natural selection to operate. Future studies could test whether there are any differences amongNative American groups that could be connected totheir historical diets.

If the evidence keeps piling up that the FADS genes affect how we process our food, they could ultimately be important in medical research, says Nielsen. Theres so muchdebate about what dietis the most healthy, he says, but we could be looking at the reason why that question doesnt have a simple answer: the best diet might be different for different people, depending on their genetics.

PNAS, 2016. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1620541114 (About DOIs).

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Migration to America took long enough for evolution to happen on the way - Ars Technica

Forbes

How To Choose Your Eevee Evolution In 'Pokmon GO:' Umbreon And Espeon Edition Forbes Of all the Pokmon in the Pokworld, Eevee remains something of a rarity. The evolutionary wildcard has always featured random evolutions, and now that Gen 2 has hit Pokmon GO, the potential forms have increased from three to five. People have long ... Pokemon Go trick: How to make Eevee evolve into Espeon and UmbreonBGR Guide: Pokemon Go has a new Eevee evolution trick for Umbreon and EspeonDestructoid Pokmon Go Eevee evolution: How to evolve Eevee into Umbreon, Espeon, Vaporeon, Jolteon and Flareon with new ...Eurogamer.net Mic -The Daily Dot -TechnoBuffalo all 65 news articles »

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How To Choose Your Eevee Evolution In 'Pokmon GO:' Umbreon And Espeon Edition - Forbes

Congo River fish evolution shaped by intense rapids: Genomic study ... Science Daily New research provides compelling evidence that a group of strange-looking fish living near the mouth of the Congo River are evolving due to the intense ... and more »

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Congo River fish evolution shaped by intense rapids: Genomic study ... - Science Daily

New items, Evolution and Power Up mechanics explained with a flowchart.

By Chris Tapsell Published 17/02/2017

Once you've started collecting enough Pokmon, you'll want to turn your attention to evolving and Powering Up to discover new creatures and make them strong enough to defend and capture Gyms. It's a surprisingly complicated decision to make, now that we know more about how complex Pokmon Go can be, so we'll start at the beginning by explaining how the evolution process works and what you should be paying attention to, before talking about when you should evolve and when you should Power Up those Pokmon.

The higher the CP, the more powerful a Pokmon will be in battle. As you play and collect Pokemon, you'll discover that not every capture has the same CP level. You can read on what CP means in Pokemon Go and how to get the highest values for your team, but in short, CP is one of the most important factors when it comes to fighting, and aside from collecting it's likely the driving force behind your desire to Power Up or evolve.

Because of those complexities surrounding your Pokmon's CP, Powering Up and evolving is more than just a case of picking the one with the highest CP and throwing your Stardust and Candy at it until you run dry. As you'll see below, sometimes you should Power Up your Pokmon first, sometimes you should evolve it first, sometimes both, and sometimes you should leave it alone.

Powering up and evolving Pokmon requires in-game resources known as Stardust and Candy. Stardust is a shared resource you receive for each Pokmon you catch, for storing Pokmon at Gyms and leveling up, while Candy is an item specific to that species - so Pikachu Candy, Pidgey Candy and so on. We've assembled some quick tips on how to get Candy in Pokmon Go here, plus how to get Stardust easily to strengthen your Pokmon.

In short, the more Pokmon of one type you catch, the more Candy you get to power up and evolve that species in its family, so it's well worth catching those low level Pidgeys to get that eventual Pidgeot evolution. Remember you can use in-game radar to locate and catch the Pokemon nearby, as well as discover Pokemon Type by location using real-world habitats.

As well as using Candy to evolve creatures, as part of the Gen 2 update certain evolutions - for existing and new Pokemon - also require a special item to evolve into certain forms. These are:

There are several important points worth bearing in mind for when you're looking to Power Up your Pokmon:

As with Powering Up, there are some important things to bear in mind for evolving your Pokmon.

We've decided to put together a flowchart, which should hopefully clear up what is a fairly complicated decision-making process for you! All the information you need is here - such as an IV calculator, CP and IVs explained, and a list of the best Pokmon in Pokmon Go - if you need it. Beneath the chart are the rules we've applied, but in text form.

You should Power Up your Pokmon if:

Want more help with Pokmon Go's Gen 2 update? Our list of new Gen 2 Johto Pokmon can teach you where to find each one, what you need to know about new Pokmon Go Berries, Special Items to evolve Pokmon such as King's Rock, Sun Stone, Up-Grade, Dragon Scale and Metal Coat, and how to get Eevee evolutions Umbreon, Espeon, and updated Egg distances and best Pokmon charts, as well as other Pokmon Go tips, tricks, cheats and guides.

You should evolve your Pokmon if:

You should avoid Powering Up your Pokmon if:

You should avoid evolving your Pokmon if:

Essentially, the Power Up and evolving decisions that you make depend on what you want to achieve. For the collectors it's fairly simple - just evolve the Pokmon whose evolutions are particularly rare - but for those interested in getting the absolute most out of their Pokmon's battling capabilities, it's certainly less so.

Originally posted here:

Pokmon Go - How to evolve, use Special Items, when to evolve or Power Up your Pokmon - Eurogamer.net

Forbes

The Strongest New Pokmon In Pokmon GO's Big Gen 2 Update Forbes Already coming strong out of the gate is Blissey, the Chansey evolution with a massive well of health that can win fights just by sitting there and absorbing damage until the timer runs out. Blissey is incredibly rare: I've never seen a single Chansey ... and more »

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The Strongest New Pokmon In Pokmon GO's Big Gen 2 Update - Forbes

NIANTIC

While there are now 80 new Pokemon to catch from the Johto region, many of them require Pokemon Special Items.

These perform as Evolution Stones to help turn some of your old original Pokemon into their next form.

[READ MORE: HOW TO GET UMBREON IN POKEMON GO]

This could prove a huge boon for those players who have some strong Pocket Monsters that have reached the Evolution ceiling, especially when it comes to taking Gyms.

To get these new Pokemon Go Gen 2 Special Items, fans are going to have to head back outside and hit their local Poke Stops.

This is because the only way to grab these vital evolution items is by spinning those bad boys. Over and over like last year.

Those Evolution items include:

Heres a list of other Candy amounts needed for Gen 1 - Gen 2 crossover Pokemon:

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Pokemon Go Gen 2 UPDATE Marill

The Pokemon Go Hub have listed some other important changes that could help trainers looking to grab as much candy as possible:

Candies: You can now get 5 candies when catching a Stage 1 evolution. 10 candies for a stage 2 evolution. Hitmonchan/Hitmonlee candies have been unified into Tyorgue candies.

Evolution items: Evolution items are required for some evolutions such as Scyther->Scyzor (Metal coat). Evolution items come out of pokestops and are consumed once used.

For pokemon with branched evolutions such as Slowpoke or Gloom, you get 2 evolution buttons, allowing you to choose with one you want. Eevees only have one button.

See more here:

Pokemon Go Special Items: How to get Evolution Stones in Gen 2 update - Express.co.uk

Prebiotic evolution: Hairpins help each other out Science Daily The evolution of cells and organisms is thought to have been preceded by a phase in which informational molecules like DNA could be replicated selectively. New work shows that hairpin structures make particularly effective DNA replicators. and more »

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Prebiotic evolution: Hairpins help each other out - Science Daily

In the Life Science Building, Martin Turcotte, University of Pittsburgh evolutionary ecology assistant professor, explained how many contemporary theories and literature focus on ecology affecting evolution or evolution affecting ecology. Turcotte has set out to prove that both affect each other reciprocally instead of independently.

This research can have a financial impact on the farming industry as well as implications throughout other scientific fields.

Turcotte focuses on evolution in a smaller period of time, which is much less focused on by the scientific community. He defines these shorter time periods as 12 generations of organisms or less.

There are several examples of rapid evolution that many long-term evolution-based models dont effectively explain, he said. For 100 years, the Atlantic Cod became much smaller in size because of fishing. Rapid evolution can happen outside of human interaction, such as the lynx population and evolution in America changing between 1850 and 1950 based on hare population.

Turcotte tried to answer three questions with his research: Does rapid evolution drive population dynamics in nature?, Do ecological and evolutionary processes influence each other? and How does rapid evolution affect species interaction?

Turcotte answered his first question by using an insect called the green peach aphid. This creature is a sap-sucking parasite that feeds on more than 130 types of plants.

The green peach aphid reproduces both clonally and sexually over a short time, making it ideal for testing evolutionary change in an experiment, he said.

He put 20 cloned aphids on one plant versus 10 aphids from one clone group and 10 from another.

I spent a whole summer in 100-degree weather lifting leaves and clicking a clicker, he said.

In the first experiment, Turcotte found the mixed group of aphids evolved about 35 percent faster than those that cloned themselves.

This result changed when he put bags over the plants, eliminating outside factors. In this experiment, both groups evolved at the same rate.

What Turcotte hypothesized was some herbivore ate part of the plant, causing a higher population density. Under these conditions, he predicted the mixed group would fare better than the single clone group.

His findings seemed to prove this in both caged experiments and experiments in greenhouses, he said.

These findings also answered his second question as a smaller plant affected evolution.

For his third question, he set up an experiment in a greenhouse. He tested evolution for 20 aphids in one clone group versus 60 in another group. He found the group of 60 evolved faster because of increased competition due to population density.

Turcotte also found different clone groups become dominant based on certain conditions. On a farm-raised crop, a certain group may be dominant while another group may be dominant on the wild counterpart of that plant.

Biology senior Nafi Dewan attended the colloquium for his class and explained the class gets visits from weekly speakers from different parts of America. He is intrigued by the different research that speakers are doing and how they are applying their findings.

Biology graduate student Asad Rizwan also attends the event for one of his classes. He now has a better understanding of his classes and how the content he learned in class is applied to the field.

@FornariLoL

news-editor.shorthorn@uta.edu

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Biology professor discloses evolution findings - UTA The Shorthorn

Pokemon Go is available for iOS and Android devices. (Niantic)

With the newPokemon Goupdate, bothSlowbroandSlowkingare now available.

In a massive February 16th update to the free-to-play mobile game from Niantic, players can catch generation two Pokemon out in the wild, but they can also evolve their existing generation one Pokemon into generation two Pokemon.

One of those generation one Pokemon that has a new evolution isSlowpoke; in fact,Slowpoke can now evolve into eitherSlowbro or Slowking.

To evolveSlowpoke intoSlowbro, all that is required is 50Slowpoke Candy. To evolveSlowpoke intoSlowking, however, you both need50Slowpoke Candy and an item called aKings Rock.

AKings Rock is one of several new evolution items added to Pokemon Goon February 16th, and you can only obtain it by visiting a PokeStop. Its one of many possible items you can get from a PokeStop, so youll just have to keep visiting more and more of them until youre lucky enough to come across aKings Rock.

OneKings Rock is needed for each Slowpoke evolution;the evolution item is discarded immediately after you use it.

You may be wondering how you can decide whichSlowpoke evolution you want to get. Well, the game gives you two separate evolution buttons, as you can see in the screenshot below via Reddit. The button on top is Slowbro, and the button on bottom isSlowking, so simply obtain the necessary items, press the evolution button, and youll get your desired second generation Pokemon.

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'Pokemon Go': How to Evolve Slowpoke Into Slowbro or Slowking - Heavy.com

Members workout int he cardio area at Fitness Evolution in Bremerton.(Photo: File photo)

An East Bremerton fitness club offering $10-a-month membership has been taken over by another fitness club chain offering $10-a-month membership.

Planet Fitness took over operation of the former Fitness Evolution on Wheaton Way on Thursday, according to a notice sent to members this week. Some programs offered by Fitness Evolution, includinggroup fitness, a kids club, and personal training were being discontinued in the transition.

A message left for a manager was not immediately returned Thursday.

Fitness Evolution opened in a vacant strip mall south of Riddell Road in 2015. Business license records show the newPlanet Fitness in Bremerton is owned by a Maryland-based group that owns several Planet Fitness locations in Western Washington.

Founded in New Hampshire in 1992, Planet Fitness has more than 1,200 gyms in 47 states, according to its website. More than 90 percent are independently-owned franchises.

This was the full message sent to Fitness Evolution members:

Dear Valued Member,

We are excited to announce that as of Thursday, February 16th,Planet Fitnesswill be taking over club and facility operations. With this change: the current offerings including Group Fitness, Kids Club, and Personal Training will not continue under thePlanet Fitnessbrand.

We will work diligently to make this transition as easy as possible for you and are pleased to welcome you to thePlanet Fitnessfamily!

Welcome to theJudgement Free Zone.

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Bremerton's Fitness Evolution now Planet Fitness - Kitsap Sun (blog)