Dr. Alex Werth and Dr. Bill Shear of the Biology Department have published a feature article in the Sigma Xi magazine, American Scientist.  The article, entitled “The Evolutionary Truth About Living Fossils,” discusses the implications of the idea, first put forward by Darwin, that some organisms have persisted unchanged for milliions of years.  The article is prominently featured on the magazine’s cover with an illustration of a coelacanth, perhaps the most famous of “living fossils.”  In the article the two professors deconstruct the concept and show that even these antiquated-looking organisms have never stopped evolving and that in fact some of them have been shown to be evolving at rates that are among the most rapid for any organism.  They also use the “living fossil” idea to examine the crucial question of “what, if anything, is a species?”

Werth and Shear both earned PhD degrees at Harvard Univeristy, albeit 21 years apart, Shear in 1971 and Werth in 1992.  Dr. Werth studies the biomechanics of feeding in both baleen and toothed whales, and the evolution of complexity.  Dr. Shear is an authority on several groups of organisms, including millipedes and harvestmen,  and has studied the evolution of early terrestrial ecosystems.  This is his fifth feature article for American Scientist.  Dr. Werth currently serves as chair of the Biology Department; Dr. Shear will be retiring in July, 2015.

Read the article here: Living fossils