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Sea Lilies – Another Explosion

The "Cambrian explosion" is a term used to describe the abrupt appearance in the fossil record of major animal phyla, without intermediate forms in lower layers. This pattern of abrupt appearance can be observed for many groups of organisms, including crinoids (sea lilies).

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A Genomic Code for Chromosomal Structure

Chromosomes regulate their own structure through their sequences of non-protein-coding DNA.

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Design in Crane Fly Eyes

Fossilized crane fly eyes discovered to be calcified and have melanin

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A Mechanism for Rapid Change in Species

Cichlid fish in Nicaraguan lakes show evidence of rapid change.

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Human Genetic Degeneration

An average of 70 mutations occur in each person.

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Different Colors on Different Soils

The specific genes have been identified that cause a lizard to match the black rocks it lives on.

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Transcription Factors and Body Morphology

Humans have unique “developmental control genes” that distinguish them from chimpanzees and other animals

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The Giant Flightless Birds Have Similar Changes in Regulatory Genes Leading to Flightlessness

Is the genetic basis of loss of flight due to mutations in protein-coding genes or in regulatory genes?

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Two Jellyfish Genomes Are as Different as Humans and Sea Urchins

Comparison of genomes of jellyfish and sea anemones highlights the importance of orphan genes in taxonomically close organisms.

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An Amphibious Whale or a Terrestrial Swimmer?

Is a recent fossil found in Peru evidence for transitional forms in an evolutionary sequence?

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Trilobite Explosion

The abrupt appearance of trilobites in Cambrian strata and their absence in Precambrian sediments is a real feature of the rock record and not due to failure of preservation in Precambrian rocks.

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The Cambrian Explosion at Qingjiang

A newly described Cambrian locality in China has added more than 50 new species to our knowledge.

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Questioning the Age of “Mitochondrial Eve?”

Confirmation that fathers may sometimes pass mitochondrial DNA to their children violates the assumptions used to calculate the age of the most recent female common ancestor of all living humans. Published in Origins v. 21, n. 2.

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Caenorhabditis elegans as a Model to Understand the Role of Epigenetic Heritage in Microevolution

In recent decades, epigenetics has been shown to be a promising field of research, since it describes changes in inheritance patterns that do not involve DNA modifications and are related to interactions between the organism and the environment. Epigenetic marks are chemical changes that occur in chromosomes and result in the silencing or activation of specific genes in different tissues. It has been…

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Modern Bird Lung Design Documented in Rapidly Buried Fossil

A fossil bird recovered from Cretaceous lake deposits in China shows preservation of some soft tissues, including a pair of lungs that appear to have functioned in a way similar to those of living birds.

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A Chemist's Perspective of the Yellowstone Petrified “Forests"

The Yellowstone "fossil forest" has many layers of volcanic ash. Trace element analysis of these layers reveals they derive from about four volcanic sources, and the layers from different sources are interlaced, implying contemporaneous eruptions of the different sources. Published in Origins n. 65.

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The Explanation for the “Yellowstone Fossil Forests:” An Uncompleted Research Project

An appeal, by Dr. Leonard Brand, for more original research, publications, and review papers to present a coherent model for the interpretation of the Yellowstone fossil forests that would bring it to the attention of the geological community. Published in Origins n. 65.

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Pterosaurs of the Triassic: An Update

This post complements an article that was written in 2014. Since then, there have been some interesting developments in the area of Triassic pterosaurs that are worth mentioning, the most important being the recent description by Britt et al. (2018) of a Triassic pterosaur from the Nugget Sandstone of Utah.

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Is There Biological Evidence of Life's Recent Creation?

During one of my frequent visits to the office of my high school headmaster, his individual tutelage yielded a life lesson that I’ve never forgotten. His exact words were, “You think you’re right!” Of course I thought I was right, wouldn’t anyone who thought they were wrong change their mind and then immediately think they are right? Now that I’m an adult biologist, I still think that I’m right. Inevitably…

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DNA and Design

Imagine walking down the beach and coming across the words “Romeo loves Juliet” written in the sand. Most of us have experienced something like this and would not be surprised, but most people would be surprised to find the entire text of William Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet written in sand. Why is this? The obvious reason is that sand is the wrong material for large writing projects. Sand grains…

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