Gavin Rylands de Beer: how embryology foreshadowed the dilemmas of the genome.
Gavin de Beer is remembered, at best, as a shadowy figure among those who gradually built up our current view of evolution and the role of genetics. This view derives from the Modern Synthesis - the recognition that emerged in the 1930s that genetics can adequately explain Darwinian evolution and speciation through natural selection. I argue that de Beer's theories of embryology had a crucial role in the Modern Synthesis, and that his work indirectly continues to influence how we think about the genome, evolution and developmental biology.
Horder
Tim J
TJ
Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, University of Oxford OX1 3QX, UK. tim.horder@anat.ox.ac.uk
D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D004626:Embryology / Q000266:history; D023281:Genomics / Q000266:history; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D006113:United Kingdom