The Australian scincid clade Lerista provides an excellent model for studying limb reduction in squamates (lizards and snakes).These Small lizards are a commonly found in Australian continent and nearly 75 different species are available.

Staying with adaptations of organisms to different environments ,but unlike the previous post (which deals with computers and simulations) lets talk about Snails.To understand the role played by proteomic changes during speciation ,Emilio Rolán-Alvarez and colleagues from Spain compared the proteome of two ecotypes (RB and SU) of the marine snail Littorina saxatilis, a case of sympatric incomplete speciation, originated as a byproduct of adaptation to distinct habitats.

The ability of organisms to generate novel characters is one of the long standing puzzle in the theory of evolution.Recent work in the field of Genetics, Evolution and Developmental biology have led to some finds suggesting that organisms have facilitated variation, a design whereby random genetic changes result in novel characteristics (phenotypes) that could be useful.

Brian Switek who writes an excellent blog Laelaps needs our help to win 2008 Blogging Scholarships. He made it into top 20 and now the winner will be chosen by voting.The winner will win 10000 dollars and might help Switek to pay his fees for final semester.Please help and support Brian by voting for him ,(and if possible pass on this message to your friends)as i did just now.
Good luck Brian !!!

Society of vertebrate paleotology (SVP) ,founded in 1940, the society now has almost 2,200 members representing professionals, students, artists, preparators, and others interested in VP. They have come out with a very nice video about their society.

WE ARE SVP is a 33-minute video that tells the inside story of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology – who we are, what we do, and why our work is important for science and society. The video is introduced and narrated by Sam Waterston, the long-time star of “LAW & ORDER.”
As mentioned above this …

DNA ( Deoxy ribo Nucleic Acid) contains all the information required for a cell to survive and this is present in the form of four bases, represented by the letters A, C, G and T. These letters represent four Nitrogenous bases present in the DNA,which are Adenine,Cytosine,Guanine and Thymine. The order of bases on a DNA strand is the DNA sequence. The sequence of DNA constitutes the heritable genetic information in nuclei, plasmids, mitochondria, and chloroplasts that forms the basis for the developmental programs of all living organisms.Determining the …

Biomed central ,the Publisher of 196 peer-reviewed open access journals added a new journal ” Epigenetics and Chromatin to their excellent collection of open access journals.This new journal will provide novel insights into epigenetic inheritance and chromatin-based interactions.
“Epigenetics & Chromatin aims to understand how gene and chromosomal elements are regulated and their activities maintained during cell division, differentiation and environmental alteration. Epigenetic research is concerned with heritable changes that do not change DNA sequence, but rather involve stable modifications of chromatin, DNA or protein conformation. Epigenetics is a …