ANIMAL EVOLUTION

Describing and understanding the evolution of the diversity of bodyplans is a major goal of evolutionary biology. Taking a modern, integrated approach to this question, a group of leading researchers describe how modern techniques and disciplines have been combined, resulting in a dramatic renaissance in the study of animal evolution.

Peter W.H. Holland: Foreword; Maximilian J. Telford & D. Timothy J. Littlewood: Introduction; I. Origins of animals; 1: Graham E. Budd: The earliest fossil record of the animals and its significance; 2: Kevin J. Peterson, James A. Cotton, James G. Gehling & Davide Pisani: The Ediacaran emergence of bilaterians: congruence between the genetic and the geologic fossil records; 3: Scott A. Nichols, Mark, J. Dayel & Nicole King: Genomic, phylogenetic, and cell biological insights into metazoan origins; 4: Andreas Hejnol & Mark Q. Martindale: The mouth, the anus and the blastopore - open questions about questionable openings; II. The Bilateria; 5: Rudolf A. Raff: Metazoan body plan origins: the larval revolution; 6: Gonzalo Giribet, Casey W. Dunn, Gregory D. Edgecombe, Andreas Hejnol, Mark Q. Martindale & Greg W. Rouse: Assembling the spiralian tree of life; 7: Detlev Arendt, Alexandru S. Denes, G'asp'ar J'ekely & Kristin Tessmar-Raible: The evolution of nervous system centralisation; 8: Maximilian J. Telford, Sarah J. Bourlat, Andrew Economou, Daniel Papillon & Omar Rota-Stabelli: The origins and evolution of the Ecdysozoa; 9: Andrew B. Smith & Billie J. Swalla: Deciphering deuterostome phylogeny: molecular, morphological and palaeontological perspectives; 10: Christopher J. Lowe: Molecular genetic insights into deuterostome evolution from the direct-developing hemichordate Saccoglossus kowalevskii; III. Themes and Perspectives; 11: Ronald A. Jenner & D. Timothy J. Littlewood: Invertebrate Problematica: kinds, causes, and solutions; 12: Nicolas Lartillot & Herv'e Philippe: Improvement of molecular phylogenetic inference and the phylogeny of Bilateria; 13: Jeffrey L. Boore & Susan I. Fuerstenberg: Beyond linear sequence comparisons: the use of genome-level characters for phylogenetic reconstruction; 14: Richard R. Copley: The animal in the genome: comparative genomics and evolution; 15: Erik A. Sperling & Kevin J. Peterson: MicroRNAs and metazoan phylogeny: big trees from little genes; 16: Andrew D. Peel: The evolution of developmental gene networks: lessons from comparative studies on holometabolous insects; 17: Patr'icia Beldade & Suzanne V. Saenko: Conserved developmental processes and the evolution of novel traits: wounds, embryos, veins, and butterfly eyespots