![]() The tools to define biodiversity have changed through time. A fundamental property of coral diagrams, that is their self-similarity, allows for the redrawing of any part of the diagram at smaller scales. This image is shown in two differently scaled parts to efficiently visualize as many details as possible, because the evolutionary timescale is much longer, and the extant diversity is much lower for red and green algae than for embryophytes. Cladogram topology, phylogenetic classification and nomenclature, diversity of taxonomic groups, geological timescale, paleontological records, and other relevant information on the evolution of Archaeplastida are simultaneously condensed for the first time into the same figure – the Coral of Plants. Second, the article offers a solution by describing the principles and methods of constructing a lesser- known image type, the coral, whose potential usefulness in phylogenetics was first raised by Charles Darwin. Therefore, these diagrams are less useful for communicating general knowledge in botanical research and education. It is emphasized that each published diagram focuses on only a single or a few aspects of the present and past of plant life on Earth. First, the article provides a historical overview of graphical tools used in the past centuries for summarizing the classification and phylogeny of plants. The present article has two primary objectives. Ford Doolittle, and Staffan Müller-Wille. This article was reviewed by Mark Ragan, W. In this article I propose a tree-like "symbiogenesis, natural selection, and dynamic Earth (synade)-model" of macroevolution that is based on these novel facts and data. As a result, these geologic processes destroyed numerous populations of organisms, and produced the environmental conditions for new species of animals, plants and microbes to adapt and evolve. At the same time, it created mountain ranges, deep oceans, novel freshwater habitats, and deserts. Over millions of years, plate tectonics and hence the "dynamic Earth" has caused destructive volcanic eruptions and earthquakes. The resulting theory of plate tectonics is now the principal organizing concept of geology. In 1929, Alfred Wegener published his theory of continental drift, which was later corroborated, modified and extended. According to the symbiogenesis-scenario, eukaryotic cells evolved on a static Earth from archaic prokaryotes via the fusion and subsequent cooperation of certain microbes. In 1910, Constantin Mereschkowsky proposed an alternative, "anti-selectionist" concept of biological evolution, which became known as the symbiogenesis-theory. In this article I argue that Darwin was still influenced by "ladder thinking", a theological view that prevailed throughout the 19th century and is also part of Ernst Haeckel's famous Oak tree (of Life) of 1866, which is, like Darwin's scheme, static. This insight of 1859 was based on his now firmly corroborated proposals of common ancestry and natural selection. Charles Darwin is usually credited with the establishment of a branched evolutionary "Tree of Life". 1850 (Charles Bonnet, Jean Lamarck and others). Despite these insights, the Bible-based concept of the so-called "ladder of life" or Scala Naturae, i.e., the idea that all living beings can be viewed as representing various degrees of "perfection", with humans at the very top of this biological hierarchy, was popular among naturalists until ca. However, the evolution of phenotypic features is not predictable, and biologists no longer use terms such as "primitive" or "perfect organisms". ![]() 3500 million year long evolutionary history. All living beings on Earth, from bacteria to humans, are connected through descent from common ancestors and represent the summation of their corresponding, ca.
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