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Open Call for Contributors: Special Issue “Adaptation to Climate Change” to appear in Evolution Letters

We are currently deep in the throes of a rapidly changing climate. Species and communities are negatively impacted at an alarming rate, therefore understanding the potential role of adaptation in mitigating the impact of climate change is both necessary and timely. Although responses to climate change are often attributed to phenotypic plasticity, examples demonstrating genetic/genomic …

Population-level variation in parasite resistance due to differences in immune initiation and rate of response

A new study published in Evolution Letters uses an experimental approach to provide new insights into the evolution of parasite resistance across populations. Author Dr. Amanda Hund tells us more. Parasites and pathogens are a common and powerful force in the natural world, a fact many of us know all too well in the middle …

Three Editorial Opportunities with Evolution Letters

Communications Editor, Preprints Editor and Associate Editor Communications Editor Evolution Letters seeks a new Communications Editor to work with our authors to help promote new research to wider audiences. The role will be particularly well suited to an early career evolutionary biologist with a keen interest in science communication. The Communications Editor is responsible for …

Should females prefer old males?

A new study published in Evolution Letters investigates whether the benefits of mating with an older, more experienced male outweigh the costs that paternal senescence may confer to the offspring. One of the study’s authors, Carolina Segami, tells us more.  Click here for a Spanish translation of this blogpost Choosing a mate is a critical …

Population spatial structure moderates sexual conflict

A new study published in Evolution Letters uses an experimental evolution approach to provide important new insights into how sexual interactions are modulated. Author Dr Francisco Garcia-Gonzalez tells us more. During the times of Justinian the Great, around the year 550 A.D., the legend says that a ruler in a vast region of what was known …

Testosterone relaxes genetic constraints between the sexes

A new study published in Evolution Letters has shown that testosterone shapes the underlying genetic parameters determining how populations respond to selection. Authors Tyler Wittman and Robert Cox tell us more. In many species, females and males look strikingly different. This phenomenon of sexual dimorphism is quite common, but it is puzzling when you consider …

How the sexes are more different than we thought

A new study published in Evolution Letters has revealed widespread and unexpected differences in gene expression architecture between the sexes. Author Dr Wouter van der Bijl summarises the findings and tells us how the study came to be. The perfect male mouse and the perfect female mouse are not the same. The sexes need to …

Larger cells have relatively smaller nuclei across the Tree of Life

A new study published in Evolution Letters finally puts paid to a long-held belief that the ratio between nucleus size and cell size is approximately constant. Although recently it has been recognised that nucleus size and cell size are not inexorably bound, the idea of a constant nucleus to cell size (NS:CS) ratio – the …

Can we pin the fluffy tails of our pet dogs on neural crest cells?

Domesticated animals share similar features, such as floppy ears, curly tails, and smaller brains. A new study published in Evolution Letters challenges the most popular explanation for how these features arose. Lead author Dr Laura Wilson tells us more. Charles Darwin was first to notice that different domestic animals share similar characteristics despite not being …