Joel Cracraft – författare

With increasing frequency, systematic and evolutionary biologists have turned to the techniques of molecular biology to complement their traditional morphological and anatomical approaches to questions of historical relationship and descent among groups of animals and plants. In particular, the comparative analysis of DNA sequences is becoming a common and important focus of research attention today.This volume surveys the emerging field of molecular systematics of DNA sequences by focusing on the following topics: DNA sequence data acquisition; phylogenetic inference; congruence and consensus problems; limitations of molecular data; and integration of molecular and morphological data sets. The volume takes its inspiration from a major symposium sponsored by the American Society of Zoologists and the Society of Systematic Zoology in December, 1989.

This edited volume is provides an authoritative synthesis of knowledge about the history of life. All the major groups of organisms are treated, by the leading workers in their fields. With sections on: The Importance of Knowing the Tree of Life; The Origin and Radiation of Life on Earth; The Relationships of Green Plants; The Relationships of Fungi; and The Relationships of Animals. This book should prove indispensable for evolutionary biologists, taxonomists, ecologists interested in biodiversity, and as a baseline sourcebook for organismic biologists, botanists, and microbiologists. An essential reference in this fundamental area.

With increasing frequency, systematic and evolutionary biologists have turned to the techniques of molecular biology to complement their traditional morphological and anatomical approaches to questions of the historical relationship and descent among groups of animals and plants. In particular, the comparative analysis of DNA sequences is becoming a common and important focus of research attention today. The objective of this volume is to survey the emerging field of molecular systematics of DNA sequences, and to appraise the strengths and limitations of the different approaches yielded by these techniques. The contributors are an internationally recognized group of investigators from different schools and disciplines who critically address a diversity of crucial questions about DNA systematics, including DNA sequence data acquisition, phylogenetic inference, congruence and consensus problems, limitations of molecular data, and the integration of molecular and morphological data sets. The work will interest all botanists and zoologists involved in systematics, taxonomy, and evolution.

This edited volume is provides an authoritative synthesis of knowledge about the history of life. All the major groups of organisms are treated, by the leading workers in their fields. With sections on: The Importance of Knowing the Tree of Life; The Origin and Radiation of Life on Earth; The Relationships of Green Plants; The Relationships of Fungi; and The Relationships of Animals. This book should prove indispensable for evolutionary biologists, taxonomists, ecologists interested in biodiversity, and as a baseline sourcebook for organismic biologists, botanists, and microbiologists. An essential reference in this fundamental area.

With a foreword by Edward O. Wilson, this book brings together internationally known experts from the scientific, societal, and conservation policy areas who address policy responses to the problem of biodiversity loss: how to determine conservation priorities in a scientific fashion, how to weigh the long-term, often hidden value of conservation against the more immediate value of land development, the need for education in areas of rapid population growth, and how lack of knowledge about biodiversity can impede conservation efforts. United in their belief that conservation of biological diversity is a primary concern of humankind, the contributing authors address the full scope of global biodiversity and its decline-the threatened marine life and extinction of many mammals in the modern era in relation to global patterns of development, and the implications of biodiversity loss for human health, agricultural productivity, and the economy. The Living Planet in Crisis is the result of a conference of the American Museum of Natural History's Center for Biodiversity and Conservation.