Evolutionary Biology: Why study it? What can it teach us about finding life beyond Earth?

Universe Today has had the incredible opportunity of exploring various scientific fields, including impact craters, planetary surfaces, exoplanets, astrobiology, solar physics, comets, planetary atmospheres, planetary geophysics, cosmochemistry, meteorites, radio astronomy, extremophiles, organic chemistry, black holes, cryovolcanism, planetary protection, dark matter, supernovae, neutron stars, and exomoons, and how these separate but unique all form the basis for helping us better understand our place in the universe.

Here, Universe Today discusses the incredible field of evolutionary biology with Dr. David Baum, who is a Professor of Botany at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, regarding the importance of studying evolutionary biology, his career highlights, what evolutionary biology can teach us about finding life beyond Earth, and what advice he can offer upcoming students who wish to pursue studying evolutionary biology. Therefore, what is the importance of studying evolutionary biology?

Dr. Baum tells Universe Today, “Humans and all living species are the products of evolution, so what could be more important than understanding how evolution works and yielded such amazing organisms and ecosystems! Most of biology is concerned with How questions, such as: How do we fight off infections? How do animals pick mates? How do plants use light energy to convert carbon dioxide and water into plant matter?”

Dr. Baum continues, “Evolutionary biologists ask Why questions. When we do that, the answer can be either historical or general ahistorical. In either case, evolutionary models enrich our understanding of the natural world. Evolution also helps us make predictions, such as the almost inevitable evolution of resistance to antibiotics, pesticides, herbicides, etc.”

The field of evolutionary biology, also called evolution by natural selection, was kickstarted in 1859 by Charles Darwin who famously crafted the notion of evolution by natural selection with his book On the Origin of Species. While groundbreaking, this new insight into the evolution of life was not accepted by the academic community as its own field until the 1930s, and waited another five decades until departments of evolutionary biology were created within the university system, as well.

Since then, the field of evolutionary biology has “evolved” into better understanding speciation, sexual reproduction, ageing, and cooperation, while incorporating fields like computer science and molecular genetics into answering these questions. It involves the study of various types of evolution, including adaptive, convergent, divergent, and coevolution, which attempt to explain how life evolves over time based on its environment, species, and interactions. Additionally, the field of medicine uses evolutionary biology to gain greater insights into evolutionary medicine and evolutionary therapies. Therefore, what are some of the career highlights that Dr. Baum has encountered while studying evolutionary biology?

Dr. Baum tells Universe Today, “Too many to recount, but perhaps the best was proposing a hypothesis for how complex cells with nuclei might have originated in 2014 and then having researchers discover a new group of organisms in 2015 that, when visualized in 2020, supported our model surprisingly well to the point where textbooks on the subject were rewritten!”

As its name implies, the field of evolutionary biology involves studying how biology evolves over time, ranging anywhere from thousands to billions of years. Evolutionary biologists aim to understand the processes that allowed life on the Earth to evolve from the first single-celled organisms that existed early in our planet’s history to the millions of complex species that inhabit our planet today. But despite the Earth being the only known planetary body with life, the questions that drive the field of evolutionary biology span beyond the confines of our small, blue world. In doing so, evolutionary biologists ask if these same processes could have allowed life to emerge on other planetary bodies, including the planets Mars and Venus, and even moons like Europa and Titan.

Today, the planet Mars is a dry, cold, and desolate world, but could life have formed billions of years ago after the Red Planet’s own formation? And while the surface of Venus exhibits extreme temperatures and pressures where life as we know it cannot exist, what about billions of years ago, as well? And what about Venus’ atmosphere, which has exhibited evidence that life as we know it might exist today at high altitudes where the conditions are more Earth-like regarding temperature and pressure? Does life exist in the deep oceans of Europa, and what about the liquid methane and ethane lakes and seas on Titan? Armed with these burning questions, what can evolutionary biology teach us about finding life beyond Earth?

“My lab is studying how evolution can get started on non-living planets,” Dr. Baum tells Universe Today. “We use both chemical experiments and analytical work that draws on principles from physics and evolutionary theory. I believe that this work will eventually clarify whether some kind of evolving biosphere is inevitable and whether it is likely to be composed of individualized entities, like cells, and whether those units are likely to have some analog of genetic systems. It is too early to know, but I suspect that individualization is likely to be universal, but I am less sure about genetics. We do suspect, however, that without genetic-like systems, cellular complexity is likely to be limited.”

As noted above, the field of evolutionary biology encompasses a wide range of expertise from a myriad of scientific disciplines, including computer science, genetics, and medicine. Additionally, it has enabled the creation of new research fields studying the evolution of robotics, engineering, architecture, and economics. For evolutionary robotics, scientists used the theory of natural selection to improve robots using artificial intelligence (AI) where the algorithms are produced to discard the least efficient robotic designs based on a specific task they’ve been assigned to do, which has allowed engineers to design efficient robots that can function in environments not friendly to humans, like nanoscales or space. Therefore, what advice can Dr. Baum give upcoming students who wish to pursue studying evolutionary biology?

Dr. Baum tells Universe Today, “Read lots of wonderful popular books to get a feel for the underlying principles but be critical of your own thinking – the concept of evolution by natural selection seems simple, but it turns out to be much more subtle and complex that folk usually realize.”

As the field of evolutionary biology continues to grow, expand, and “evolve” and help other scientific fields do the same, so will our understanding of how life on the Earth came to be and potentially on other worlds, as well. In the 165 years since its introduction by Charles Darwin, the field of evolutionary biology has grown to encompass far more than what Darwin potentially imagined, so it’s exciting to think where evolutionary biology will be in the next 165 years, as well.

Dr. Baum concludes by telling Universe Today, “Evolutionary biology is central to the study of why organisms are the way they are, but also underlies the most profound questions in astrobiology and physics: Is there a drive to life in the universe? When a world spawns life, is there a drive to complexity and intelligence? And, by extrapolation, are we alone in the Universe?!”

How will evolutionary biology help us understand our place in the universe in the coming years and decades? Only time will tell, and this is why we science!

As always, keep doing science & keep looking up!

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