Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Books
  3. Evolution in Isolation
  • Cited by 62
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press
Online publication date:
May 2019
Print publication year:
2019
Online ISBN:
9781108379953
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108379953
Subjects:
Plant Sciences, Life Sciences, Evolutionary Biology
Information

Book description

Oceanic islands are storehouses for unique creatures. Zoologists have long been fascinated by island animals because they break all the rules. Speedy, nervous, little birds repeatedly evolve to become plump, tame and flightless on islands. Equally strange and wonderful plants have evolved on islands. However, plants are very poorly understood relative to animals. Do plants repeatedly evolve similar patterns in dispersal ability, size and defence on islands? This volume answers this question for the first time using a modern quantitative approach. It not only reviews the literature on differences in defence, loss of dispersal, changes in size, alterations to breeding systems and the loss of fire adaptations, but also brings new data into focus to fill gaps in current understanding. By firmly establishing what is currently known about repeated patterns in the evolution of island plants, this book provides a roadmap for future research.

Reviews

'Kevin C. Burns has provided a beautifully written, well-paced and enjoyable review of island syndromes. He opens with a focus on some iconic animals, which he deploys to highlight the challenges involved in building on initial ‘natural history’ observations, to develop and then rigorously examine clear hypotheses of how evolution in isolation favours particular functional traits and syndromes. The following five chapters set out to review specific plant syndromes, each of which is clearly described, illustrated with examples (and some well selected figures), carefully considered and then rounded off with a clear set of conclusions. Burns succeeds in putting together a rigorous synthesis of existing information on island plant syndromes. Any student of island biology, from undergraduates to seasoned researchers will be sure to find something of interest in this book.'

Robert J. Whittaker - University of Oxford

‘In this slender, captivating volume, Kevin Burns surveys hypotheses about island syndromes - 'repeated patterns in plant form and function on islands' … The volume ends with fascinating case studies (e.g., the cucumber tree of Socotra), and summarizes traits hypothesized as island syndromes … This should give biologists excellent grounds to dig deeper into the fascinating biology of island plants …’

Robert D. Holt Source: The Quarterly Review of Biology

Refine List

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

Contents

Contents
References

Metrics

Altmetric attention score

Full text views

Total number of HTML views: 0
Total number of PDF views: 0 *
Loading metrics...

Book summary page views

Total views: 0 *
Loading metrics...

* Views captured on Cambridge Core between #date#. This data will be updated every 24 hours.

Usage data cannot currently be displayed.