Evolution__3rd_Edition

16 PART 1 / Introduction
Figure 1.9
Theodosius Dobzhansky
(1900–75) in a group photo in
Kiev in 1924; he is seated second
from the left at the front, in the
great boots.
. . . and inspired research in the
field and lab ...
The reconciliation between Mendelism and Darwinism soon inspired new genetic
research in the field and laboratory. Theodosius Dobzhansky (Figure 1.9), for example,
began classic investigations of evolution in populations of fruitflies (Drosophila) after
his move from Russia to the USA in 1927. Dobzhansky had been influenced by the
leading Russian population geneticist Sergei Chetverikov (1880–1959), who had an
important laboratory in Moscow until he was arrested in 1929. Dobzhansky, after he
had emigrated, worked both on his own ideas and collaborated with Sewall Wright.
Dobzhansky’s major book, Genetics and the Origin of Species, was first published in
1937 and its successive editions (up to 1970 (retitled)) have been among the most
influential works of the modern synthesis. We shall encounter several examples of
Dobzhansky’s work with fruitflies in later chapters.
E.B. Ford (1901–88) began in the 1920s a comparable program of research in
the UK. He studied selection in natural populations, mainly of moths, and called
his subject “ecological genetics.” He published a summary of this work in a book
called Ecological Genetics, first published in 1964 (Ford 1975). H.B.D. Kettlewell
(1901–79) studied melanism in the peppered moth Biston betularia, and this is the
most famous piece of ecological genetic research (Section 5.7, p. 108). Ford collaborated
closely with Fisher. Their best known joint study was an attempt to show that the
random processes emphasized by Wright could not account for observed evolutionary
changes in the scarlet tiger moth Panaxia dominula. Julian Huxley (Figure 1.10a)
exerted his influence more through his skill in synthesizing work from many fields. His
book Evolution: the Modern Synthesis (1942) introduced the theoretical concepts of
Fisher, Haldane, and Wright to many biologists, by applying them to large evolutionary
questions.
From population genetics, the modern synthesis spread into other areas of evolutionary
biology. The question of how one species splits into two a the event is called
speciation a was an early example. Before the modern synthesis had penetrated the
subject, speciation had often been explained by macromutations or the inheritance of
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