Evolution and Medicine in Undergraduate Education: A Prescription for All Biology Students

Abstract

The interface between evolutionary biology and the biomedical sciences promises to advance understanding of the origins of genetic and infectious diseases in humans, potentially leading to improved medical diagnostics, therapies, and public health practices. The biomedical sciences also provide unparalleled examples for evolutionary biologists to explore. However, gaps persist between evolution and medicine, for historical reasons and because they are often perceived as having disparate goals.Evolutionary biologists have a role in building a bridge between the disciplines by presenting evolutionary biology in the context of human health and medical practice to undergraduates, including premedical and preprofessional students. We suggest that students will find medical examples of evolution engaging. By making the connections between evolution and medicine clear at the undergraduate level, the stage is set for future health providers and biomedical scientists to work productively in this

The Red Queen’s Race: An Experimental Card Game to Teach Coevolution

“…The RQH can teach students some key evolutionary aspects of the problem: populations respond rapidly to strong selection, and parasites relentlessly adapt to host defenses. It is our moral obligation to train students on these issues, particularly students destined for medical professions (Antonovics et al 2007;Read and Huijben 2009;Nesse et al 2010;Antolin et al 2012). We feel that teaching host-parasite coevolution in the context of the RQH is an excellent way to accomplish this goal.…”

“…There are more and more calls for the incorporation of evolutionary principles into applied fields (Denison et al 2003;Antonovics et al 2007;Read and Huijben 2009). For example, the evolutionary medicine movement seeks to incorporate evolutionary thinking into medical and pre-medical training (Nesse et al 2010;Antolin et al 2012). Education in evolutionary biology must grow to match our increasing awareness of the centrality of this field.…”

An Evolutionary Medicine Approach to Understanding Factors That Contribute to Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

“…In evolutionary medicine, this understanding, known as antagonistic pleiotropy theory, is explained as follows: ‘Fitness accrues via reproductive success summed across all stages of an individual's life history, and reproductive events in early life contribute more to fitness than do those late in life' [16]. An extended postreproductive life span should evolve when postreproductive individuals can make significant contributions to the fitness of their children and grandchildren [49].…”

“…Approaches based on experiments and investigations are required to elucidate underlying proximate mechanisms that lead to the development of a disease. On the other hand, evolutionary (Darwinian) medical approaches are required to explain the ultimate, or evolutionary, causes such as why a disease is present and why a disease develops in humans [4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16]. Evolution is not a goal-oriented phenomenon.…”

Evolution and Medicine

“…Medical examples can be used in the classroom to engage a broad range of students, and to elucidate a number of basic evolutionary concepts Antolin et al 2012). For example, common descent may be illustrated by the effectiveness of biomedical research with model organisms, the genotype to phenotype connection is demonstrated by variation in disease symptoms among individual patients, and the concept of environmentally influenced fitness is demonstrated in "diseases of the modern world."…”