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Evo-Devo of Butterfly Wing Patterns

Submitted by afeltrin on Tue, 02/26/2019 - 16:15

This article is questioning whether the previously believed concept of structural organization (the body part) in animal development having arisen from differences in the animal’s structure is true or not. The methods included the use of artificial selection to observe the pattern organization in butterfly wings and the possible factors that may restrict the evolution of the wings. They tested eyespots on the front and back of the wings in one species of butterfly and hypothesized that one eyespot (pattern on the wing) is completely independent of another. The results stated a visible positive correlation between eyespot sizes and wing sizes. As wing size was increased, the eyespots, regardless of being either on the front of the wing or the back, also increased. This study impacted the field because, at the time, it wasn’t truly determined if an animal’s structural organization led to independent evolution of certain traits. Through this experiment, the use of wing size (a form of structural organization) and eyespot size (a trait) were compared to prove if the evolution of certain traits were impacted by structures, like wings.

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