A river meanders lazily through the plains but, in rocky terrain, might tumble rapidly down as a waterfall, sometimes in multiple cascades. Charles Darwin had earlier proposed that changes in the characteristics of organisms happen very slowly over time and generations, just like the river’s gentle flow.

Researchers find that altered signalling patterns for survival by a fan-throated lizard species could be setting the stage for its evolution

The big, bright, green-coloured Andaman day gecko is a sight to behold; only that, you have to go all the way to the Andaman Islands to get a glimpse of it. Endemic to the islands, these geckos live in trees and are active during the day. Thanks to cash crops grown on these islands today, they can be found in plenty, feeding on bananas, coconuts and betel nuts. They belong to the genus called Phelsuma, believed to have evolved from Madagascar, an island about 6000 km away from the Andamans! A new study has traced their evolutionary history and has thrown some light on how they differ from the other geckos in the Andamans.

The Indian Society of Evolutionary Biologists (ISEB), an independent consortium of researchers and faculty working on evolutionary biology in India, is holding its first conference on the 24th and 25th of October, 2019, at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), Bengaluru. The two-day meeting is themed around ‘Celebrating Ecology and Evolution in India’. It is bringing together eminent researchers and students across the country, who are actively involved in research on evolutionary biology.

The blackbuck is an antelope species native to the Indian subcontinent. Although the term 'antelope' is loosely used to refer to many ruminating ungulates, the blackbuck is the only animal that belongs to the genus named Antilope. True antelopes belong to one of the four genera—Gazella, Nanger, Eudorcas and Antilope. Scientists are still debating the evolutionary relationships between these members. In a recent study, researchers at the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, have traced the evolutionary relationships of the blackbuck (Antilope cervicapra) using phylogenetics. The study was published in the journal Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution.

Researchers from the Natural History Museum, London, have uncovered the evolutionary links between the different species of centipedes dating back to Gondwana. 

Researchers at the NCBS, Bengaluru, studied how Swallowtails evolves and changes its appearance and colour at various stages of its elaborate life cycle to develop their colour defence strategies.

Researchers from IISER Pune, have reported that environment and evolution can influence the ‘dispersal syndrome’ in fruit flies. This study was supported by the DST, Government of India.

Researchers from the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore, discover a novel behaviour among bonnet macaques and consider the implication this may have one their cognition and evolution of species.

Some details of the reproductive journey of a fig wasp, to find a suitable tree and lay eggs while simultaneously pollinate it in the process are known. In a recent study, scientists from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, fill in the gaps in our knowledge about this fascinating journey.