Evolutionary Biology (saylor.org)

One of the best ways to understand the present is to understand the past. Evolutionary Biology is the study of the changes in life forms over time—changes that have occurred over millions of years as well as those that have occurred over just a few decades. In this course, we will look at the various mechanisms of evolution, how these mechanisms work, and how change is measured. The concepts you learn in this course will serve as a foundation for studying fossil records and current classification schemes in biology.

We will begin the course by reviewing the evolutionary concepts of selection and speciation. We will then learn to measure evolutionary change through comparisons with the Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium, to understand the process of change through Game Theory, and to interpret and classify changes by creating phylogenies. The course will wrap up with a look at the history of life according to the fossil record and a discussion of the broad range of life forms as they are currently classified.

At the end of this course, you will have a better understanding for the evolution of biological life. Also, this course will prepare you for future study and research in macroevolution, microevolution, genetics, anthropology, zoology, botany, behavioral biology, and computational biology.

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:

Define evolution and describe different types of selection.

Provide examples of microevolutionary forces and describe how they impact the genetics of populations.

Describe the Hardy-Weinberg principle and solve problems related to Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium.

Provide examples of games used in evolutionary game theory.

Connect biological phenomena to game theory.

Develop simple phylogenies from molecular or morphological data.

Identify important evolutionary events that have occurred throughout geologic time.

Characterize and provide examples of major plant and animal phyla.