25 Q 8

How does paedomorphosis been important to evolutionary diversification of salamanders?

Paedomorphosis has evolutionarily diversified salamanders by giving certain adults within a adult species juvenile characteristics while other adult species may not. When species mature they may adjust, or in some, metamorphose to/with environmental conditions. The difference between some species going through paedomorphosis and others not creates a broad variety of evolutionary paths, added to also by the later adjusting/metamorphing process mentioned before. When species retain many of the general features of their larval body form it could enhance the species' ability to survive.

Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License