Evolution plays a critical role in our daily lives, yet it is one of the most overlooked principles of life. It is the mechanism that determines who lives, who dies, and who gets the opportunity to pass traits on to the next generation, and the next, and the next...

Have you ever wondered

• why you have to take a full course of antibiotics when you become ill rather than discontinue your prescription when you feel better?
• why species extinction is relevant to our own survival?
• why insects continue to decimate our nation’s food crops when lethal new pesticides are being created every day?
• why deadly strains of old diseases are rapidly reappearing that are resistant to current antibiotics?

The answers to these and other life-altering questions can be found in the understanding of a simple theory put forth by Charles Darwin in 1859—evolution.

Evolution—the underpinning of all of biology, affecting our health, our food supply and the vast web of life—is driven by two simple mechanisms, variation and natural selection. Variation and mutation in offspring offer the possibility of change in succeeding generations, and natural selection, in which the environment—including everything from climate to predators to asteroids from outer space—determines which mutations survive to reproduce. It’s such a simple theory, yet we see millions of examples of it at work in our everyday lives.

In medicine, illnesses as common as strep throat and diarrhea could be untreatable within ten to fifteen years because microorganisms are quickly developing immunities to commonly used antibiotics. Evolution guides us in developing new antibiotics to counter this biological warfare.

In agriculture, Illinois corn farmers are plagued by a worm that lays its eggs in corn roots, decimating crops. Evolution can assist us in generating strategies in the battle against these newly emerging pests.

In species loss, we are witnessing the possibility of an extinction of fifty percent or more species on Earth. Within this fifty percent, the cure for cancer could be discovered in a single tree species growing at the edge of a rainforest that is about to be burned. Evolution can give us the tools to cope with this devastation and an idea of what the world will look like afterward.

The Evolution Project

The Evolution project is a seven-part, eight-hour television broadcast series, an extensive Web site, a far-reaching educational outreach initiative, and a HarperCollins companion book penned by acclaimed science writer Carl Zimmer. Resources from these initiatives will be available to all people from high school biology teachers and students to others with a natural curiosity about the world around them.

Evolution, the project’s eight-hour television series, travels around the world to examine evolutionary science and the profound effect it has had on society and culture. From the genius and torment of Charles Darwin to the vast changes that spawned the tree of life, from the role of mass extinctions in the survival of species to the power of sex to drive evolutionary change, Evolution will be fascinating and far-reaching in scope. The series will also explore the emergence of consciousness, the success of humans, and the perceived conflict between science and religion in understanding human life.

Evolution will showcase a content-rich interactive Web site with streaming imagery, animations, simulations, dynamic timelines, conversations with experts, current news bulletins, and extensive links to evolution-related learning resources world-wide.

In addition to the general public Web site, Evolution encompasses an unprecedented array of special resources for educators and students: an internet-based professional development course in evolution for biology teachers; entertaining video answers to questions about evolution that high-schoolers frequently ask; interactive student lessons in evolution online; and a national program of teacher-training workshops on evolution.

The goal of Evolution is to heighten public awareness about what evolution is and how it works, and to dispel common misunderstandings. The project seeks to illuminate why evolution is relevant, to improve its teaching, and to encourage a national dialogue on the issues currently surrounding this science.

Click here to go to the Evolution Website