Evolution Case Study

1. Evolution is a scientific process of organismal change over a period of time, resulting in genetic modification; it is the development of life. Evolution cannot take place in one individual’s lifetime; rather it is a population-level process that takes place over many generations. This scientific process depends on mutations, or random changes in a species DNA sequence. Evolution is broken down into three mechanisms that drive the process of evolutionary change: Natural Selection, Genetic Drift, and Migration (Wenzel 2015). Mutations can cause differences in physical traits and is the cause of variation within a population. The mechanism of Natural Selection is a causal process that is the variation in an organism’s survival and reproduction

An example of evolution that has taken place over the last 200 years is the Italian Wall Lizard. In 1971, ten Podarcis sicula or Italian Wall Lizards were introduced to the island of Pod Mrcau. Decades later the lizards were compared to the colony from which they were taken. It was found that their diets had changed to be one heavy in vegetation. The lizard now had a larger head, different gut structure, and has a much greater bite force (Listverse 2011). The lizards also had developed “cecal valves,” which are muscles between the large and small intestine that “slow down food digestion in fermenting chambers,” allowing their bodies “to process the vegetation 's cellulose into volatile fatty acids” (National Geographic Society 2008). In this case, the Italian Wall Lizard has evolved and adapted to its new environment within a few generations. This example of evolution within the past decades was caused by a forced migration, Natural Selection and adaptation. The ten lizards were forced into a new environment, and they eventually adapted to this environment. The lizards that were able to eat a diet of vegetation rather than meat were able to survive in this new environment heavy in vegetation, and pass on their genes to the next