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The dynamics of evolutionary stasis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2016

Niles Eldredge ,
John N. Thompson ,
Paul M. Brakefield ,
Sergey Gavrilets ,
David Jablonski ,
Jeremy B. C. Jackson ,
Richard E. Lenski ,
Bruce S. Lieberman ,
Mark A. McPeek  and
William Miller III
Niles Eldredge
Affiliation:
Division of Paleontology, American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West at Seventy-ninth Street, New York, New York 10024. E-mail: epunkeek@amnh.org
John N. Thompson
Affiliation:
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, A316 Earth and Marine Sciences Building, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95060. E-mail: thompson@biology.ucsc.edu
Paul M. Brakefield
Affiliation:
Institute of Biology, Leiden University, Post Office Box 9516, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands. E-mail: brakefield@rulsfb.leidenuniv.nl
Sergey Gavrilets
Affiliation:
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Department of Mathematics, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996. E-mail: gavrila@tiem.utk.edu
David Jablonski
Affiliation:
Department of Geophysical Sciences, 5734 South Ellis Avenue, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637. E-mail: djablons@midway.uchicago.edu
Jeremy B. C. Jackson
Affiliation:
Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92039. E-mail: jbjackson@ucsd.edu
Richard E. Lenski
Affiliation:
Center for Microbial Ecology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan 48824. E-mail: lenski@pilot.msu.edu
Bruce S. Lieberman
Affiliation:
Departments of Geology and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Kansas, 120 Lindley Hall, Lawrence, Kansas 66045. E-mail: blieber@ku.edu
Mark A. McPeek
Affiliation:
Department of Biological Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire 03755. E-mail: mark.mcpeek@dartmouth.edu
William Miller III
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, Humboldt State University, 1 Harpst Street, Arcata, California 95521. E-mail: wm1@axe.humboldt.edu
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Abstract

The fossil record displays remarkable stasis in many species over long time periods, yet studies of extant populations often reveal rapid phenotypic evolution and genetic differentiation among populations. Recent advances in our understanding of the fossil record and in population genetics and evolutionary ecology point to the complex geographic structure of species being fundamental to resolution of how taxa can commonly exhibit both short-term evolutionary dynamics and long-term stasis.

Information

Type
Macroevolutionary Patterns within and among Clades
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 31 , Issue S2 , 2005 , pp. 133 - 145
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

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References

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