In Natures "15 evolutionary gems" evolution-evangelism packet, two of Nature's "evolutionary gems" looked at birds. The first such gem showed "Differential dispersal in wild birds" -- but before we get caught up in the jargon, let's just cut to the main question: What sort of evolutionary change was observed? From reading Nature's evolution-evangelism packet, one is told that the "findings illustrate the large effect of immigration on the evolution of local adaptations and on genetic population structure" or that "evolutionary differentiation can be rapid and occur over surprisingly small scales." So exactly what was this rapid, large evolutionary change?...

Early in 2006, the journal Science published a long article titled "Evolution in Action" purporting to give three examples showing the glory of Darwinian evolution. As I discussed at that time, what it really showed was "microevolution in action." Last year during the bicentennial anniversary of Darwin's birth, Nature tried to top Science by releasing a packet titled "15 Evolutionary Gems." The packet purported to show "just what is the evidence for evolution by natural selection." Yet much like the Science piece, many of the examples in the Nature packet entail trivial examples of small-scale evolution. This first installment of...

Last year, during the bicentennial anniversary of Darwin's birth, Nature released a free online packet titled "15 Evolutionary Gems." Its subtitle was "A resource from Nature for those wishing to spread awareness of evidence for evolution by natural selection." It might have been better subtitled 'A evangelism packet for those wishing to spread the good news about Darwinism.' After all, when Nature announced the packet, they said they were heeding a prior call which "urged scientists and their institutions to 'spread the word'" about evolution and "highlight reasons why scientists can treat evolution by natural selection as, in effect, an...

Advocates of intelligent design have long been skeptical of the claim that the majority of our genome is nonfunctional gibberish, a mere relic of our evolutionary past. Many of the key arguments for common ancestry are based around the supposition that certain loci of our genome are functionless. But the gaps in our knowledge of the genome (in which such supposition resides) are continually shrinking. A recent paper published in Science by Kondo et al. reported on the discovery that some of the supposed "non-coding" regions of the RNA transcript actually actively encode for short peptides that regulate genes involved...

Another school year is set to begin at high schools and colleges where the next round of biology students will be filled with evolutionary misinformation. At the center of this propaganda campaign are the many biology textbooks used to indoctrinate young minds with old dogma. These textbooks contain the latest evolutionary newspeak, but the underlying lies are no different.In their text The Living World (Fifth Edition, McGraw Hill, 2008) evolutionary apologists George Johnson and Jonathan Lobos rehearse the usual lies. Students are told that "Microevolution Leads to Macroevolution" with the giraffe's neck serving as the example of how small change is supposed...

by Jeff Zweerink Twinkle, twinkle little star, My, oh my, how large you are. How’d you get to be so big? When gas pressure and magnetic fields should have prevented you from forming?Okay, so my poem doesn’t rhyme, but it does communicate two important issues regarding stars. First, astronomers [...]

Kenneth Richard SamplesHow can a Christian think about eschatology (the study of “last things”) in a careful and intellectually responsible manner?Let me offer three suggestions for believers to carefully consider when approaching the controversial theological topic of the “end times.”1. Understanding the Bible’s Apocalyptic LiteratureEvangelical theologian and eschatology specialist George Eldon Ladd notes the following: [...]

Bye-bye, big bang?; the wearable therapy; Cro-Magnon frogs; marsupial mysteries; and more in this weeks News to Note.

Did Methuselah live through the Flood or die along with all those outside the Ark? Bodie Hodge, AiGU.S., explores what the Genesis record shows.

July 31, 2010 Did you know your heart is an electrical appliance? Thats right. Currents of electrical ions are vital to its function as a contractile organ. Now, researchers at the University of California have found another thing electricity does for your heart: it guides the developing heart into the proper shape. This is a key study showing how epigenetic factors factors above and beyond the genetic code are essential for the formation of body parts. The research team, publishing in PNAS,1 explained the purpose of their investigation (Note: morphogenesis refers to the origin of shape, and cardiomyocytes are the specialized muscle cells that make the heart beat): Cardiac morphogenesis is a complex process that is mediated by a coordinated set of cellular and molecular as well as environmental factors. Recent studies have shown that epigenetic forces such as cardiomyocyte contractility and intracardiac hemodynamic flow regulate this process. Furthermore, in vitro studies suggest that cardiomyocytes can realign themselves according to electrical conduction directionality. However, because electrical cardiac conduction and mechanical contractile forces are intimately coupled in the intact heart, it is difficult to assess the individual contribution of these influences to overall heart organogenesis. Here, we make use of several zebrafish cardiac mutants to uncouple these two influences, and find that electrical conduction exclusive of contractile influences can directly participate in remodeling and morphogenesis of the vertebrate heart. In other words, electrical conduction guides the individual heart cells into position during heart development. They said in the Discussion part of their paper that it is known that The direction of growth and orientation of various cell types in tissue culture can be influenced by externally applied electric fields. They added, Furthermore, endogenous [inside organism] electric currents exist in a variety of tissues and have been hypothesized to influence cell migration and shape. This paper announces confirmation of that hypothesis for heart formation: Our in vivo results [using living zebrafish] indicate that physiologic electric currents can indeed have an impact on cell morphology and overall cardiac organogenesis. The mutant fish without the electrical conduction working properly developed heart disease. So how does this work? They explained, These electrical effects might be mediated through intracellular calcium fluxes which can affect cell polarization. Furthermore, a number of cell surface receptors... can also be redistributed in the cell membrane by electric fields. Does this finding provide hope for heart patients? Patients with electrical conduction disorders get better when the beats are re-synchronized. The researchers explained why that works: Thus, overall cardiac improvement from the resynchronization of the ventricles in heart failure patients manifesting conduction disorders may be due to beneficial realignment and improved remodeling of the myocardium primarily from proper and synchronized electrical signaling. Get the electricity right, and the heart shapes up. Now those defibrillation devices and electrical heart stimulators start to make more sense. This means that stem cell therapy (07/20/2010) may need an electrical jumpstart to work properly: Given that previous cardiac cell-based therapy has provided only a modest improvement in cardiac function, they ended, pointing therapy in a new direction, electrical cellcell communication and stimulation may be required for optimal integration and alignment of engrafted embryonic cardiomyocytes and skeletal myoblasts in the injured myocardium to improve overall myocardial performance. Live better electrically!

Noah's ark has been 'found' again - this time on Mt. Ararat in Turkey. Will this discovery hold up to scientific scrutiny?