Evolutionary Biology

Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes—including natural selection, genetic drift, and mutation—that have produced the diversity of life on Earth. It seeks to explain the history of life, from the origin of species (speciation) and the adaptation of organisms to their environments, to the shared ancestry that connects all living things. By integrating evidence from genetics, paleontology, and ecology, evolutionary biology provides the foundational, unifying framework for all of modern biology, explaining how life changes and diversifies over time.

Population biology is the study of populations of organisms, focusing on the factors that affect their size, density, genetic composition, and distribution over time. It integrates principles from both ecology and evolutionary biology to understand how populations interact with their environment and how they change genetically from one generation to the next. By examining dynamics such as birth and death rates, migration, and the effects of natural selection and genetic drift, this field provides the fundamental framework for understanding how species adapt, persist, and evolve.