Harvard doctoral students describe projects at the cutting edge of evolutionary inquiry
Might it be the humble pelvis that makes us human, and not the brain? Do butterfly hybrids mean evolutionary trees should look more like networks? What can deer mice teach us about genetics and inheritance? And what’s up with all the human bones at Roopkund Lake? A quartet of Harvard doctoral students gave a glimpse of the future of evolutionary inquiry Thursday evening, describing the cutting-edge tools they’ve become adept at wielding to investigate conundrums that get to the heart of some of the most fundamental questions of our time: how we became human, what happened in our past, and how animals slowly become different. The event, “Frontiers in Evolution,” drew about 100 people to the Geological Lecture Hall in Harvard’s Geological Museum building. Part of the Harvard Museum of Natural History’s “Evolution Matters” lecture series, the event was moderated by lecturer on organismic and evolutionary biology (OEB) Andrew Berry. It featured...