ArticleEvolution & development2019
Investigating the evolution and development of biological complexity under the framework of epigenetics.
Article in Evolution & development, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed.
- Can the Timing of the Origin of Life Be Inferred from Trends in the Growth of Organismal Complexity?Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Topological and variational modularity: A case study using the pectoral girdle across the Chrosomus eos-neogaeus hybridization complex.Anatomical record (Hoboken, N.J. : 2007) · 2026Article
- Water temperature modulates multidimensional plastic responses to water flow during the ontogeny of a neotropical fish (Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2025Article
- Review
- Bird clades with less complex appendicular skeletons tend to have higher species richness.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Divergent vertebral formulae shape the evolution of axial complexity in mammals.Nature ecology & evolution · 2023Article
- Crucial Development: Criticality Is Important to Cell-to-Cell Communication and Information Transfer in Living Systems.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Review
- Temporal instability of lake charr phenotypes: Synchronicity of growth rates and morphology linked to environmental variables?Evolutionary applications · 2021Article
- Investigating the evolution and development of biological complexity under the framework of epigenetics.Evolution & development · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Biological complexity is a key component of evolvability, yet its study has been hampered by a focus on evolutionary trends of complexification and inconsistent definitions. Here, we demonstrate the utility of bringing complexity into the framework of epigenetics to better investigate its utility as a concept in evolutionary biology. We first analyze the existing metrics of complexity and explore the link between complexity and adaptation. Although recently developed metrics allow for a unified framework, they omit developmental mechanisms. We argue that a better approach to the empirical study of complexity and its evolution includes developmental mechanisms. We then consider epigenetic mechanisms and their role in shaping developmental and evolutionary trajectories, as well as the development and organization of complexity. We argue that epigenetics itself could have emerged from complexity because of a need to self-regulate. Finally, we explore hybridization complexes and hybrid organisms as potential models for studying the association between epigenetics and complexity. Our goal is not to explain trends in biological complexity but to help develop and elucidate novel questions in the investigation of biological complexity and its evolution.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.