30th edition on This Scientific Life

The thirtieth edition is hosted by Bob O'Hara on This Scientific Life. Enjoy! And spread the word.






Before you go, did you know you can follow CoE on Twitter? Yes you can! CarnyEvolution.

Become a top evolution blog

This site has been "awarded" the title of a Top Evolution Blog. So has quite a few others, and I realize, of course, that it's just a gimmick to drive people to a site made to earn money.

Be that as it may, the list of blogs is actually fairly good, with links to many good blogs at least to some extent about evolution.



Now, if your blog is not on that list (and, incidentally, mine isn't), and if you want it to be a top evolution blog, what better advice can I give you than to always remember to submit one (good) or two (better) posts every month to Carnival of Evolution?

Logo/button competition

← Carnival of Evolution has a splendid logo, don't you think? We don't need a new one. However, I'd like to get another one for a specific purpose.

When people have their posts included in a CoE edition, wouldn't it be nice if they could put a little image on the post to identify it as a CoE-post? I think so. Like a stamp of approval, similar to the image that posts on Research Blogging has (see example here).

However, I have zero skills in that direction, so I'd like to ask someone else to make one.

Logo Competition:

What: Make a 70x85 pixel logo that CoE contributors can put on their CoE posts.

Why: So that we may make more people aware of the carnival, and promote both reading and writing about evolution.

How: I don't know how, but once you have figured that out, send it to me at bjorn@bjornostman.com.

When: No hard deadline, but I won't start choose among any submissions before the next edition of CoE is out (which will be on December 1st).

What's in it for me? The creator of the new CoE button will of course be featured both here and on my own blog Pleiotropy, but beyond that I'm afraid CoE has no funds for a monetary prize.

The button should be recognizable and distinct, so that people will quickly learn that it refers to Carnival of Evolution. I could suggest that it used the same colors as the CoE logo, for example, but that's not a strict requirement.

If you have any other questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Number twenty-nine is ready

The 29th edition of Carnival of Evolution is now ready at Byte Size Biology. It's a great game of evolution this time.

Kick-off is a post about how penguins got their coats:

According to an international team of researchers, a close examination of feathers from a recently unearthed giant penguin fossil revealed that it was clad in reddish-brown and grey, instead of the familiar black-and-white colors worn by its modern relatives. Additionally, the researchers found differences in feather structure between ancient and extant penguins; differences that may offer clues for how modern penguin feathers evolved.

At Punctuated Equilibrium.

Next month our host is This Scientific Life, and you can submit one (good) or two (better) posts about evolution here. Go on, don't be shy now.

Survey of CoE readers - results

34 people took the survey of CoE readers (31 completed it). Here are the results:

1. For how long have you known about Carnival of Evolution?
Since the beginning (August, 2008): 38.2%
Since sometime in 2009: 32.3%
Since sometime in 2010: 35.5%

2. How often do you read Carnival of Evolution?
Every month/edition: 44.1%
About every other edition: 32.4%
Less than every third edition: 8.8%
This is my first time: 14.7%

3. On average how many posts featured in the Carnival do you click through to read on the authoring blog?
0: 2.9%
1: 5.9%
2: 17.6%
3: 32.4%
4: 11.8%
5: 17.6%
6: 5.9%
More than 6: 0.0%
All: 5.9%

4. How often do you contribute blog-posts to Carnival of Evolution?
Never (I don't blog): 32.4%
Never (I don't write about evolution): 2.9%
Never (other reason): 11.8%
Every month: 11.8%
Other: 11.8% (most answers were every other or every third edition)

5. Is evolutionary biology your main interest in science?
Yes: 50.0%
No: 50.0%

6. What is your highest level of education?
High school degree: 5.9%
College degree: 14.7%
Master's degree: 35.3%
PhD degree: 32.4%
Something else: 11.8% (all four getting degrees)

7. Do you work in science?
Yes: 61.8%
No: 38.2%

8. Do you believe in evolution?
Yes: 91.2%
No: 5.9%
Unsure: 2.9%

Why/why not?
1. Evidence
2. "believe in" ?? that's mighty weird wording!
3. Biology is kinda pointless without it...
4. But you should rephrase "Do you accept evolution?"
5. However, Evolution is NOT a matter of belief. It is a matter of fact. Poor phrasing of the question on your part.
6. Evolution is a fact.
7. "Believe in" is a dymb way to put it. I accept evolution.
8. Because of all the mountains of evidence!
9. SCIENCE...
10. Really - I ACCEPT evolution. One should not use 'believe' in this context!
11. Best explains mountains of evidence.

★ ★ ★

Thanks to all who took the survey. Also to those whose pet peeve is that one should not say 'believe in evolution'. To those of you: You need to look up what 'believe' means. It does not only refer to a faith-like belief, but can be a belief grounded in evidence, such as "I believe that E. coli have evolved an ability to metabolize citrate" or "I believe whales evolved from land animals". To believe irrespective of evidence - on faith - is only one meaning. Don't let the 'believers' distort the meaning of the word 'believe', please.

Merriam-Webster | Cambridge | Urban | Encarta | Newbury House

Carnival of Evolution #28 - Featuring Sandwalk

WELCOME

to the 28th edition of Carnival of Evolution! This time the carnival has returned home. Not since the first edition back in August 2008 has an edition been posted here. That is cause for celebration, so let's do that with a little survey. I am curious who reads Carnival of Evolution, so please spend the next two minutes tops taking this brief survey about yourself and CoE. Results will then be posted here for the bemusement of all.

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And now we'll try something new. As previously mentioned, I thought it might be glorious to feature a single blog that features outstanding posts about evolution. Today, that blog is Sandwalk, by Larry Moran.

Larry got his PhD from Princeton University in 1974, and is now a professor in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Toronto. He is co-author of two textbooks in biochemistry. His research interest are molecular evolution and evolutionary theory, which he studies using heat shock genes in various organisms. And he blogs a lot about evolution.

For example, he has blogged about our relationship with Charlemagne: Our Ancestor Charlemagne: Taller than Average?, Are You a Descendant of Charlemagne?, and My Family and Other Emperors.

Other recent posts about evolution are Mutations and Complex Adaptations, about Michael Lynch's research on molecular evolution, and On the Origin of the Double Membrane in Mitochondria and Chloroplasts. Larry also has a profile on Research Blogging, which is a collection of posts on peer-reviewed articles.

Sandwalk has also featured a series of posts by Arlin Stoltzfus. The series of six posts is an "introduction to the history of evolutionary theory and the concept of mutationism. There are many ways in which the so-called "Modern" Synthesis has to be revised and extended. One of them is to reinstate the concept of mutationism which was purged from evolutionary theory in the 1940s. If you want to understand why this is important then these articles are the place to start," in Larry's words. You can start with the last post in the series on the Mutationism Myth.

Larry also blogs extensively about creationism: Stephen Meyer Explains Modern Evolution, Four Nails Exposed, The Parting of the Red Sea: Science vs. God, and On Describing IDiots as Creationists, to mention just a few.

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But Larry is not alone. There are lots of blogs about evolution, and the very aim of this carnival is of course to highlight those for the benefit of all. And in this edition posts from a total of 19 blogs are included. Enjoy!

Byte Size Biology Iddo Friedberg thinks we should credit viruses a lot more when it comes to evolution. In Life serves viruses, we learn that viruses are imbedded in the genomes of most/all other genomes in all three domains of life. The post is about a recent paper in PLoS Biology, Genomic Fossils Calibrate the Long-Term Evolution of Hepadnaviruses.

Punctuated Equilibrium GrrlScientist blogs about the same story in Fossil virus leaves evolutionary footprints in songbird DNA, suggests new ways to predict pandemics, and elaborates the point that the viruses were found to be much older than previously thought, pushing back their origin from 6000 years ago to 19 million years ago (which must be particularly disappointing for the Young Earth Creationists).

360 Degree Skeptic Andrew Bernardin discusses male mating strategies, slimeballs vs. good guys. The Logic of Objectifying Females.

Beasts in a Populous City Olivia V. Ambrogio fails to convince a creationist in the zoo that evolution is true. Beasts in a Populous City: Creationism at the Zoo (or, How I Missed Seeing the Gorilla Outdoor Pavilion).

Kind of Curious John reviews a book, The Invention of Air, and discusses how oxygen influenced life on Earth, in The Evolution of Air.

Tripbase Every month CoE gets spammed with submissions from blogs that exist to promote some business, and they are almost always lists with 50 this or 15 that that has nothing at all to do with evolution. They are never included here, but for once I will make an exception, because Katie Sorene's post on 10 Evolution Exhibits that will Blow Your Mind is actually very good. Nine of these natural history museums are places that I really want to visit. The last, not so much. Take a look to see what I am talking about.

PLoS Blogs Network Eric Michael Johnson discusses a paper on confirmation bias in psychological tests with human subjects, in Reflections on the WEIRD Evolution of Human Psychology. This has ramifications from the discipline that is always under attack from practitioners of evolutionary biology: evolutionary psychology. Here, however, EP is shown to also have problems that have nothing to do with biology. In summary, American undergraduate students so commonly used as test-subjects, are highly unrepresentative of the human species.

The Atavism David Winter discusses a paper on mating behavior in a marine snail, Sunday Spinelessness - Throwing pesky males off the scent. As with many other species where males produce many more sperm than females produce eggs, it is an advantage for the males to mate with as many females as possible. The females, however, don't gain anything from copulating with more than a handful, typically, and in these marine snails, the mating behavior of the males is quite aggressive, and are therefore dangerous to the females. The females counter by smelling like males, making males accidentally copulate with other males.

Kele's Science Blog Kele Cable has two posts on how to think about Evolutionary Theory as a Theory of Forces and Drift as Biology's First Law.

NeuroDojo Zen Faulkes tells us that in wolf spiders, eating large meals is heritable: NeuroDojo: Eat ‘til you can’t eat no more: Evolution of the pig-out. Such gluttonous spiders do better than normal spiders in the wild with no predator birds, but worse than the wild spiders when predators are around.

The Online Laboratory of Kevin Zelnio Kevin Z discusses some papers on Evolution and Costs of Firefly Lights. Novel gains of light production appear more rare than losses, not to anyone's surprise, I would think.

Teenage Atheist Raithie explains how stupid evolution is once in a while. In Unintelligent Design: Recurrent Laryngeal Nerve, we learn why mammals are so badly designed, and how that is in fact evidence of evolution.

Down the Cellar Graves writes about a paper on Elephant fish diversification via rapidly evolving electrical signals. In elephantfish it appears that rapid speciation is driven first and foremost by rapid signal evolution, and also that the signaling trait is under sexual selection only, rather than natural selection.

Pleiotropy Bjørn Østman wonders how a crackpot got a manuscript published in a supposedly serious peer-reviewed journal, with drawings of developmental processes, claiming that they have something to do with evolution: Pivar's pure fantasy published. And in memory of the life of an evolutionary biologist who died recently, George Williams on pleiotropy, on the importance of pleiotropy (i.e., when a gene affects more than one trait) in evolution.

Why Evolution Is True Jerry Coyne explains his own recent paper in Science, A test of the snowball theory for the rate of evolution of hybrid incompatibilities, about a test of the "snowball theory" using Drosophila: Our new Science paper.

Denim and Tweed Jeremy Yoder presents his take on a recent Nature article by Martin Nowak, Corina Tarnita, and E.O. Wilson that has made quite a splash among evolutionary biologists: The evolution of eusociality. Their idea is that eusociality does not need kin selection to evolve, and that kin selection and inclusive fitness anyway don't explain many cases of eusociliaty. Contrary to what a good number of people have claimed, the paper does too present an alternative model. In New cooperation theory has major Mommy issues, Jeremy argues that if Nowak et alia are right, then eusociality isn't a good explanation for coorporation, since eusociality would be more like enslavement. (If one wants to be up to date on the latest of evolutionary theory, this paper is a definite must-read.) Prominent biologists are adamant that the three authors are on the wrong track, e.g. Jerry Coyne and Richard Dawkins (Dawkins has been hostile towards group selection for decades).

It Takes 30 Another biologist who attacked the paper by Nowak et al. is Stuart West. Just a week prior to the Nowak paper, West is co-author on another Nature paper, Promiscuity and the evolutionary transition to complex societies, that uses phylogenetic analysis of birds to show that kin selection and low promiscuity explains cooperative behavior. And in To help or not to help?, Becky Ward explains the paper. She also has a post about a paper on the evolution of cooperation in microbes, Trade balances in microbial communities.

Lab Rat SE Gould's sister writes about Guest Post - Survival of the fittest? and takes issue with the phrase 'survival of the fittest' - coined by Herbert Spencer, but used by Darwin in the fifth edition of The Origin from 1869 [wiki]. The paper explores the reason why some members in a microbial population confer antibiotic resistance to members who do not. Altruism, or just a side-effect of metabolism?

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We've reached our only friend, then end. Next edition is scheduled to be hosted by Iddo Friedberg, assistant professor at the Microbiology and Computer Science departments at Miami University, Ohio, on Byte Size Biology. Submit your posts about evolution using this form, and don't forget to take the survey for CoE readers, if you haven't already.

28th edition of CoE to be hosted right here

The upcoming edition of Carnival of Evolution will be hosted here on Carnival of Evolution. With this 28th edition I am planning to initiate a new feature, which will not be about bugs. Rather, in addition to the regular blog-entries about any topic in evolution hosted on the many great blogs that at least occasionally feature evolution, I will feature one particular blog that I think features many good posts about evolution. Whether this feature feature will continue will be entirely up to the hosts to come (for a list, go to Blog Carnival and click on 'future hosts' on the CoE widget - also available on this page).

Which blog will be featured, you ask? Well, I'd be a fool to give it away, I think, so just stay tuned.

And the next edition is scheduled for October 1st, so there is just enough time to submit one (good) or two (better) posts about evolution through the online form. And on that note, I'd like to encourage everyone to also submit posts on evolution that they didn't write themselves. There is nothing wrong with passing on a great post to share with everyone else.

After taking over the administration of CoE from Irradiatus in the beginning of 2010, I have been thinking about ways to expand the carnival. I have not had too much success with this, but I am happy to observe that we are at least surviving, thanks to yourselves. However, I do wonder if we are all there is. Does this email list (which currently contains almost 80 emails of people who have either previously contributed, asked to be on the list, or could potentially contribute to CoE) represent everyone in the blogosphere who blog about evolution, or is there perhaps some segment that we have not yet reached? Do any of you know of blogs that should obviously participate in bringing evolution to the masses? If so please let them know of CoE, or shoot me an email so I can do it.

Carnival of Evolution #27 – Feed Your Head Edition

It's that time of the month, again. A new edition of Carnival of Evolution has just been posted at 360 Degree Skeptic. Andrew Bernadin present an appetizing menu of evolutionary items that's (not) guaranteed to satisfy anyone's palate.

A sample (never has that been a fitter term):

8. The Thoughtful Animal is hungry, so we’ve got a two-course feast featuring spotted hyenas, matrilines, and female preference. First, Silver Spoon Hyenas? Followed by Silver Spoon Hyenas: Maternal Social Status Affects Male Reproductive Success. Bravo, Jason G. Goldman.

August edition has come to town

The 26th edition of the reliable, the dependable, the capital, the sublime Carnival of Evolution has come to town. Town of The Thoughtful Animal, to be precise.

A sample:

Continuing with female sexual preferences, Kevin Zelnio claims that female urochordates have few, if any inhibitions. "Yep, that's right. They get it on with any male gamete that passes their way. They just don't give a [rhymes with duck]. Boom chaka-laka-boom. These loose lizzies are all about increasing genetic diversity if you know what I mean."

Sad (very sad) that you didn't get a post in this edition? Hurry and submit to the September edition already, then.

Reminder: Submit to CoE

Much as usual, and to my delight, I have personally seen a tremendous amount of posts on various aspects of evolution in the last month. I may be biased in that I happen to follow blogs that write about evolution more than, say, developmental and cell biology, but I'd still wager that developmental an cell biologists wished that they had their own creationists to stimulate interest in a wider audience.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that Carnival of Evolution plays a huge role in distributing the best on the web about evolution to the masses... okay, I would say that, actually. It is doubtful, in my cocky mind, that 2009 would have been the big thing it was for evolution without us.

You know what I'm getting at, so here it is:

Use the form on Blog Carnival to submit one (good) or two (better) posts.

CoE #25 on Culturing Science

The 25th edition of Carnival of Evolution is ready at Hannah Waters' blog, Culturing Science.

A sample:

As we know, the process of evolution takes an incredibly long time. How do evolutionary biologists study the process of natural selection just in their lifetimes? Two posts this month feature experimental methods to test traditional theories of natural selection.

I'm not sure I know this myself. There's good of evidence that some processes can be very fast (e.g. my favorite Croatian lizards described by Herrel et al., 2008). Yes, some things take millions of years, like the morphological change from terrestrial ungulates to whales, but many other events can be observed in our lifetimes. Another example is Drosophila speciation.

CoE #24 on NeuroDojo

Since Zen Faulkes is a brainy scientist, we thought it might be fun to have a special CoE edition on all things brain evolution. It is now up on his blog, NeuroDojo.

My lawyers are working on deciding whether Zen can be sued for this:


I like it a lot, but I like a good lawsuit even more.

Here's my favorite of the brain evolution posts:

Evolutionary changes in brains must often force evolutionary changes to occur in other structures, not the least of which for the vertebrates in the skull. The complex relationship between brains, faces, and skulls in primates is discussed over at A Primate of Modern Aspect.

Next month the carnival will be hosted by Hannah on Culturing Science, winner of the Research Blogging award for Best New Blog 2009. Expectations run high.

We're featuring brain evolution in the upcoming edition

The next edition of Carnival of Evolution will be on NeuroDojo in just a few days (June 1st). Zen Faulkes will be featuring posts anything related to brain evolution prominently in this edition, but I fear that not very many bloggers are writing about brain evolution, so here are a few pointers for those with enough enthusiasm.

The RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Japan has lots of resources on brains, including this primer on brain basics and evolution:

Through the course of evolution, the brain has undergone considerable changes. In many invertebrates, such as worms, the nervous system consists of no more than a net or bundle of nerve cells. In fish, amphibians, and reptiles, the brain is a well-developed organ consisting of several distinct structures, such as the cerebellum, tectum, and basal ganglia. These structures are specialized for different basic functions, such as detecting visual patterns, generating walking or swimming movements, generating reflexive responses, and so on. Mammal brains also contain many of these primitive structures, so scientists can understand many aspects of our own brain function by studying these areas in other animals.

Journals on brain evolution: Brain, Behavior and Evolution | Brain | Current Anthropology | Journal of the History of the Neurosciences | Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience

There's plenty, so get crackin'! Submit one (good) or two (better) posts on anything about evolution, and particularly about brain evolution, through this online form.

CoE featured on Blog Carnival today

Today Blog Carnival the website with all the carnivals, is featuring Carnival of Evolution on their home page and on Facebook.

The big event captured for perpetuity:

May edition up today on Springer

The 2010 May edition of our beloved Carnival of Evolution is up today on the official blog for Springer Verlag's journal, Evolution: Education and Outreach. And with that, surely getting your post accepted in CoE is now akin to peer-reviews on some level. Thanks to Adam M. Goldstein for hosting.

An excerpt:

The squeamish are advised to prepare themselves before visiting GrrlScientist’s post about a newly identified genus of leech (“those spineless blood sucking animals”) which makes its home in the nose of mammals. The photographic evidence is compelling, to say the least; indeed, so is the science. A second posting discusses recent work on the genetics of personality based on the genetics of the Great Tit, a bird (Parus major). Those Tits with a variant in the DRD4 gene show a greater tendency to explore their environment, offering suggestions about how humans with this variant might behave. (Incidentally, the title of this post, “What do great tits reveal about human personality,” is no doubt likely to show up in Internet searches for topics not having to do with evolutionary biology….) She also writes about recent work in which UV rays are used to shed some new light (sorry, couldn’t help it) on fossils, revealing details about fossilized feathers in a Microraptor gui skeleton.

Next month CoE will be hosted by Dr. Zen on Neurodojo. We are going to try to make it a special edition featuring brain evolution, but that of course only works if people submit posts about brain evolution. Doesn't take much brains to figure that out. Or does it? So, you have a whole month to write up one (good) or two (better) posts pwning brain evolution. CoE has a fast track review system, and Dr. Zen will be the functioning as both editor and reviewer(s) in this edition. Use this form on Blog Carnival to submit your posts.

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Next edition of CoE is fast approaching

Get on board! Don't miss the fast train! Don't be left hanging to dry. Skedaddle!

Every month some sucker or other sends me a note saying that they had this great post written up, but they just forgot to submit it to CoE. What a shame that is. Every time.

Fret not, though. Here's your warning:

The May edition of Carnival of Evolution is less than two days away. Currently submissions are about half spam and half serious posts. We can do better than that! I know, because I have seen plenty os posts in April on evolution that have not been submitted. Tsk tsk.

So, use this online form to submit one (good) or two (better) posts that you have written about anything pertaining to evolution.

Also, if you're interesting in hosting CoE, drop me an email. For the heck of it I suggest we let people who haven't hosted before have a go at it until we run out of volunteers. After that the usual suspects can go again.

22nd edition is up at Beetles In The Bush

Carnival of Evolution #22 is now live at Beetles In The Bush.

There’s a new kid on the blog, and Chadrick Lane jumps right into fray with his inaugural post at The Ancestral Mind. In Ancestral Mind in the Twitterverse: Discovering the information age through evolution, he recounts the magical feeling of visiting the Smithsonian Natural History Museum’s David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins, prompting him to ask “How is it that we have gone from a common ancestor with chimpanzees to a blogging, social networking, moon walking, singing and dancing species in just around 6 million years?” An impressive first post!

CoE featured on Discovery Channel

Yes, it's true. Carnival of Evolution has made its way into the (more) popular media of television. Sort of.

On TV, Larry Moran, Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Toronto and author of the blog Sandwalk, very deliberately chooses to show his blog post with the CoE logo on it, clearly to build his credibility as an expert on evolution. And nipples.



All you professors out there who are will be giving interviews, take a hint! Have The Origin on your bookshelf and the CoE logo on your screen. That way no one will doubt your expertise on evolution.

See TV-clip here, and Larry's post about it here.

P.S. This post is not an endorsement of Larry's statements about why men have nipples.

The carnival is up at Mauka to Makai

The twenty-first edition of CoE is now up on Mauka to Makai, and it has its fair share of the stuff we evophiliacs love to death.

Help spread the word, so we can as many visitors over there as possible. Twit it (I like twit better than tweet), facebook it, blog it, phone it, say it, author it, sign it, and read it.

Next edition on April first (fools edition) will be hosted by Ted on Beetles In The Bush. Go on and submit your evolution posts, already.

Time to submit those posts on evolution

You've got the rest of this Sunday to submit your posts about evolution and anything related to Carnival of Evolution. Use this online form to submit one (good) or two (better) posts.

Kelsey is hosting on Mauka to Makai, and if all goes well, the March edition will go up tomorrow.

We need your posts on evolution

Next edition of Carnival of Evolution is less than one week away!

The next edition will be hosted on Mauka to Makai, and in order to even come close to outdoing Psi Wavefunction's phylogenetic blog-post edition from February 1st, it is imperative that you all submit at least one (good) or two (better) posts on the subject of evolutionary biology. Remember, only __________ (your name here) can prevent CoE from burning to the ground.

Please use this online form to submit your posts.

Carnival of Evolution #20

Psi Wavefunction posted the newest edition of CoE late last night on Skeptic Wonder. And I do declare that this is the awesomest edition I have ever seen - of this carnival, and if any blog carnival. And, it's all about evolution.

Psi actually, genuinely, did phylogenetic analysis of the submitted posts, converting the URLs into amino acid sequences, and then made phylogenetic trees based on them. How out of this world is that?!

It going to be very hard to outdo CoE #20, but I know future hosts will try their very best. Because that's what they've signed up for...

CoE #21 will be at Mauka to Makai.

Next edition at Skeptic Wonder

I have finally gotten admin permission to edit the account at BlogCarnival, so now I can assign bloggers to the next editions of Carnival of Evolution.

CoE #20 will be hosted by Psi Wavefunction on Skeptic Wonder on February 1st - which is really close, so go on and submit your evolution-posts already! Use this form to submit them.

Mighty soon I plan to announce who will host the coming months. More volunteers are still needed, so send me an email if you're interested (bjorn@bjornostman.com).

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Update Jan. 17th:

The schedule now looks like this.
Feb 01, 2010 Skeptic Wonder
Mar 01, 2010 Mauka to Makai
Apr 01, 2010 Beetles In The Bush

Carnival of Evolution #19

A new edition is up on Christie Wilcox's blog, Observations of a Nerd.

Notice that this is a very important edition: It is the first after the celebration of Darwin 200th birthday (year) has ended, and there is some speculation that nothing much will happen in evolution research and blogging in 2010. Fourteen submissions for January 2nd isn't bad at all in that light. However, those posts and that research was of course done last year, so maybe the February edition is going to really slim?

It is still to be decided what the hosting schedule for this spring will be - just a few have volunteered so far, and I'd like to hear from more before I write a list. But, rest assured there will be a new CoE #20 up somewhere in the beginning of February, so don't forget to submit one (good) or two (better) posts about evolution before then. Please use this online form to submit.

Image from Lab Rat's post on bacterial cell wall evolution.