Evolution and Last Week's News and Research

Evolution is the change in the genetic makeup of a population over multiple generations. The theory was referred to as descent with modification by Charles Darwin, who argued that all life descended from a common ancestor. Evolution explains the diversity of species and similarities between species' fossils, anatomies, embryos, and DNA. These similarities allow scientists to piece together evolutionary relationships and identify species' shared ancestry.

> Darwin developed his theory of evolution with the help of an economic theory.
> Learn about the independent lines of evidence that support evolution.

> Explore evolutionary relationships with this interactive tree of life.

All life on Earth possesses genetic material, and members of the same species share most of theirs, with small variations. A few of these differences correspond to traits that make some organisms better suited to their environment than others. Through natural selection, these organisms are more likely to survive, reproduce, and pass on their traits, which alters the population's future gene pool. Other evolutionary forces, such as mutations, also introduce changes, which can accumulate over time to produce new species.

> Natural selection, mutation, gene flow, small population size, and nonrandom mating are the five major forces of evolution.

> New flu vaccines are needed each year because of influenza's high mutation rate. 

> Are there any traits that are impossible to develop through evolution? 

Evolution has been directly observed in organisms with short lifespans, including fish, mosquitoes, and microbes. Through artificial selection, humans have directed evolution by purposely breeding specific organisms—crops, livestock, and dogs—to pass on preferred traits. Scientists also use evolutionary biology to study antibiotic resistance, track diseases, facilitate drug discovery, develop vaccines, and engineer enzymes for industrial use.

> Dogs began to evolve from gray wolves at least 20,000 years ago.

> Scientists can track and predict disease outbreaks with phylogenetic trees.

> Exploiting bacterial evolution to engineer enzymes earned half a Nobel Prize.

Discover more: 

> LUCA—the last universal common ancestor—lived about 4.2 billion years ago.

> The world's longest-running evolution experiment has tracked genetic changes across more than 80,000 generations.

> Humans continue to evolve, with recent adaptations including enhanced oxygen storage and frostbite resistance.

Keep learning by exploring all our findings on Evolution here.

News in Context

1440 brings you the knowledge and context behind the week's stories:

Computing pioneer Margaret Hamilton, whose failsafe saved Apollo 11 and who led the development of the Apollo program's flight software, died at 90. (More)

> Before becoming NASA's first software engineer, Hamilton developed software to support research in chaos theory and the US' first air defense system. (More)

> Hamilton was once honored with a portrait made of moonlight. (More)

Belgian-American physicist Francis Halzen was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for their role in the discovery of high-energy neutrinos from space. (More)

> See how a cubic kilometer of Antarctic ice has helped scientists detect neutrinos.

> Neutrino astronomy has enabled scientists to study extremely powerful, otherwise invisible, cosmic phenomena.

The Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded to French chemist Henri B. Kagan and Japanese chemist Kensō Soai for developing methods to more easily create left- or right-handed molecules. (More)

> Why are some molecules beneficial while their mirrored versions can be toxic?

> Molecular mirror images were discovered after taking a closer look at wine.

A suite of AI tools developed solutions to issues in 22 scientific fields by identifying shared mathematical structures between problems in one field and solutions in another. (More)

> The large language models powering AI tools are perfectly suited for finding patterns across disciplines. (More)

> Watch an LLM's "brain" find patterns as it authors output in real time. (More)

Research Spotlight

Like all great researchers, we love spending time learning about the latest breakthroughs across science and technology. Here's what we found this week.

A year of congestion pricing improved lower Manhattan's air quality by 13%.

Columbia University | Staff. An analysis of data from 15 pollution monitoring sites identified a decrease in fine particulate pollution within the congestion zone that exceeded the predicted variability due to weather and other factors. The change aligned with the 11% decrease in the number of vehicles entering the area. (More)

> Why is fine particulate matter dangerous, and what are the health risks?

> View a map of real-time air quality from more than 10,000 locations worldwide.

Diffusion models used in AI image generation may help forecast flash floods.

Pennsylvania State University | Ty Tkacik. While existing AI models have predicted historical rainfall, their daily forecasts have been unable to capture the suddenness of flash floods on hourly timescales. By leveraging techniques for processing noisy data used by some AI tools, the new model outperformed hourly deep learning models after processing similarly noisy hourly weather data. (More)

> See a visualization of a diffusion model creating an image from visual noise.

> In the US, flash floods kill more people than lightning, tornadoes, and hurricanes.

Researchers map a better means of achieving self-sustaining nuclear fusion.

Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory | Rachel Kremen. Nuclear power has long relied on fission—the separation of heavy elements into lighter ones—rather than fusion, which requires enormous energy to reach the necessary temperature and density for ignition. A new framework suggests that heating the plasma before increasing its density, rather than the reverse, is much less energy-intensive. (More)

> See how nuclear fusion can provide near-limitless clean energy.

> Considered the fourth state of matter, plasma makes up 99% of the visible matter in the universe.

Astronomers made a novel observation of a star consuming its companion.

MIT | Jennifer Chu. Astronomers observed a red dwarf siphoning material from its companion brown dwarf, making it the first such observation of a system where a low-mass object is pulling material from another low-mass object. Located about 300 light-years from Earth, the brown dwarf moves in an orbit that could fit inside the sun and loses an estimated 1.3 trillion pounds of material every second. (More)

> Why are brown dwarfs considered failed stars?

> If they were closer, Earth could also siphon material from its moon.

Etcetera

> Listen to a reconstruction of the sound of the Big Bang.

> Why is it impossible to divide by zero?

> Elemental impurities, structural defects, and radiation can give diamonds color.

> Watch the only bird that can perform sustained backward flight, in slow motion.

> Einstein reauthored his manuscript on the special theory of relativity to help sell war bonds during World War II.

> View the original set of emojis for communication—a batch of 176 icons released for Japanese cell phones and pagers in 1999.

> In space, fire takes the shape of burning spheres instead of rising flames.
 

> Female Komodo dragons can have virgin births of exclusively male offspring.

> Which country has the best science students?

> Looking for your glasses but can't spot them without them? Improve your vision by looking through a pinhole.

> See a visual comparison of flight speeds, from brown bats to literary dragons.

> Under specific conditions, corpse crystals can grow on dead bodies.