Researchers in the field of biological sciences suggest that statistical “noise” causes evolutionary rates to accelerate markedly over a short period of time. For decades, researchers have noticed that the pace of evolution tends to accelerate over shorter time periods, such as five million years compared to fifty million years. This general trend suggests that evolutionarily “younger” groups of organisms tend to show higher rates of speciation, extinction, and body size evolution than older groups, among other differences.

It appears that evolutionary processes occur on different time scales, which may require a new theory linking microevolution and macroevolution. A bigger question torments scientists: why?

There are possible explanations. A new species could survive on a new island chain, allowing for greater diversity as it spreads into new niches. An asteroid could hit Earth, increasing the extinction rate. Perhaps species evolve to an “optimal” trait value and then reach a plateau.

A new explanation: statistical noise

Published in the article PLoS Computational Biology, now offers a completely new explanation for understanding this evolutionary pattern: statistical “noise.” The paper was written by Brian K. O’Meara, a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Tennessee, and Jeremy M. Beaulieu, an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Arkansas.

The authors state: “Using a new statistical approach, we find that this time-independent noise, often dismissed as unimportant, creates a deceptively hyperbolic picture, giving the impression that the rate of evolution increases over shorter time periods, when in fact it does. NO. Another In other words, our findings suggest that younger, younger generations [групи зі спільними предками]”It seems to evolve faster not because of intrinsic properties but because of statistical noise.”

Challenging an old assumption

The study combines mathematics, statistics and biology to show that this long-standing hyperbolic pattern is an anomaly; because this model ignores the fact that all species on Earth are defined by their unique characteristics and variation in those characteristics.

It is a generally accepted scientific principle that the simplest possible explanation that fits the data is usually correct. The fact that evolution occurs on completely different time scales is much less noise in the numbers.

Ultimately, the study highlights the critical importance of accounting for inherent biases and errors in interpreting biodiversity patterns at both fine and deep time scales.

In an unpublished abstract of their study, the authors state: “[о] Our results may be viewed as regrettable: a model that could generate thousands of papers containing truly interesting biological hypotheses can be explained away as an artifact.

“But this is actually an advance; we have explained the general pattern we see in the world. Biology is full of mysteries: the true response to one allows us to move on to the next. There are still many questions about biological measurements, but the current paradigm of creating time-dependent measurements probably needs to end.”