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Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science Of Evo Devo And The Making Of The Animal Kingdom | 
| Author: Sean B. Carroll
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  37 reviews
Sales Rank: 210849
Format: Bargain Price
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 350
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.5
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.2
Dewey Decimal Number: 571.85
ASIN: B000QTD5J8
Publication Date: April 2005
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Amazon.com
"Every animal form is the product of two processes--development from an egg and evolution from its ancestors," writes Sean B. Carroll in his introduction to Endless Forms Most Beautiful. The new science of "evo devo"--or evolutionary developmental biology--examines the relationships between those two processes, embryonic development and evolutionary changes, despite their radically different time scales. Carroll first offers a recap of how genes express themselves in a growing embryo, then peers into the life histories of real-life examples to explain how those genes have changed (or not changed) over millions of years of evolution. Paraphrasing Thomas Huxley, he asks us to consider evolution and development as two sides of the same coin. We may marvel at the process of an egg becoming an adult, but we accept it as an everyday fact. It is merely then a lack of imagination to fail to grasp how changes in this process that assimilated over long periods of time, far longer than the span of human experience, shape life's diversity." The book's second half is where Carroll really gets at the meat of evo devo, explaining how regulatory genes control such mysteries as individual and population changes in butterfly's spots, jaguar fur, and hominid skulls. Evo devo is one of the hottest areas of study in 21st-century biology, and Carroll's outline of the field is a great place to start understanding it. --Therese Littleton
Book Description
What Brian Greene did for string theory, Sean Carroll—a leading biologist—does for Evo Devo. Evo Devo is evolutionary developmental biology, the third revolution in evolutionary biology. The first was marked by the publication of The Origin of Species. The second occurred in the early twentieth century, when Darwin's theories were merged with the study of genetics. Now the insights of Evo Devo are astonishing the biology world by showing how the endless forms of animals—butterflies and zebras, trilobites and dinosaurs, apes and humans, are made and evolved. Perhaps the most surprising finding of Evo Devo is the discovery that a small number of primitive genes led to the formation of fundamental organs and appendages in all animal forms. The gene that causes humans to form arms and legs is the same gene that causes birds and insects to form wings, and fish to form fins; similarly, one ancient gene has led to the creation of eyes across the animal kingdom. Changes in the way this ancient tool kit of genes is used have created all the diversity that surrounds us. Sean Carroll is the ideal author to lead the curious on this intellectual adventure—he is the acknowledged leader of the field, and his seminal discoveries have been featured in Time and The New York Times. 16 pages of color and 100 black-and-white illustrations.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 32 more reviews...
 Super info - ok writing July 4, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is so full of interesting, amazing information - but the writing is very, very dry. I loved "Your Inner Fish" which overlaps the content of this book, but is much more engaging.
 Interesting reading June 4, 2008
This is an interesting take on evo-devo. I'd recommend it for the popular science reader (its stays in pretty shallow waters scientifically).
 The "Butterfly Effect" in the genes April 8, 2008
The best feature of this book is the fantastic sense of the complexity of the development of the organism from the genes. Sean shows with genius how the tiniest changes in a gene can lead to huge effects in the developing organism -- much like in Chaos theory (see the book "Chaos: making a new science" for example)in mathematics how complex systems are affected by the tiniest influences (puff of air from a butterfly's wings) which can be magnified to change the entire face of a complex multi-determined system from what it would have been (i.e. weather patterns) over time. This book shows how and why all life is related, yet very different. For example, we share about 50% of our genes with a banana plant, and about 99% of our genes with Chimpanzees, yet we are very different physically and intellectually. This applies ESPECIALLY with that most unique of human characteristics -- our large and staggeringly complex brains. There are not really any other books out there like this. A MUST-READ in an emerging and exciting area of science. Stunning.
Very good! April 3, 2008
This book explains very well the way that DNA works. It answers some questions like, "How can I share 90% of my dna with a mouse?" "How do mutations eventually lead up to a change in an animal's form?" I had never heard a satisfactory explanation for how genes function before reading this book. It was very easy to understand, and an enjoyable read.
It was a tad repetitive, with the author listing a couple of very detailed examples for every point he made. To be honest I appreciate this, but I did skip over some material after I had gotten the point of the chapter.
I love popular science, particularly books about prehistory and evolution, but I avoid those books that are all about God vs. Evolution. Yes, the religious right is a very large, colorful, tantalizing target, but I prefer just the science. This book was great in that respect.
A New Synthesis of Biology February 27, 2008
Carroll's main thesis is that evolutionary biology is in the midst of its third great revolution. First, with Darwin, we had brilliant ideas including natural selection and descent with modification. This was incomplete however, as Darwin was wholly ignorant of genetics, and went without the support of the experimental biologists. Second, with the Modern Synthesis, mechanisms of genetics and evolution were reconciled enough so that most experimental biologists discarded ideas such as saltation and soft inheritance.
Molecular biology and embryology still had more to offer to evolutionary biology, Carroll argues. In the last 20-25 years, these two fields have begun to explain evolution of animal development. How is the fruit fly genome structured to organize when various genes are turned on or off at the right time and place in the developing organism? How is the overall bilateral animal body-plan preserved, while variation in the details is maximized? What are the major changes that occurred to form new phyla?
"Endless Forms" is very informative, but aptly explains all of the relevant jargon, and would be appropriate for both high school graduates and PhDs, and everyone in between.
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