Genetics and Phylogenetics in the Evolution of Sex Pheromones

Abstract

As with each area addressed by this symposium, understanding the evolution of sex pheromones has some unique challenges not shared by the others. Like the physiologist, the evolutionary biologist seeks rules that govern nature; but the special challenge is in understanding events that have transpired in the distant past, through processes that, although they continue in contemporary time, generally proceed on a time scale that is too protracted for us to observe. In the absence of a fossil record, this challenge is addressed by looking for patterns in extant species that suggest a historical sequence and processes that have governed it: patterns of trait divergence between related species, patterns of trait similarity among taxa only distantly related, and patterns of genetic control, which suggest modes of selection on the trait. By piecing together such fragments of an imperfect record, it is hoped that we can create a logical picture of how it all happened. The contributors to this symposium represent some of the field’s best attempts at constructing such a picture for the evolution of sex pheromones.