Applying evolutionary theory to biodiversity studies

我们愿意为我们如何在面临濒临灭绝的情况下最好地保存进化史提供理论支持和实践指导。每当一个物种灭绝时，它所包含的相互作用的基因复合体也会随之消亡。一些物种有许多近亲，因此在这段历史中有很多冗余(想想不同的老鼠物种)，而另一些物种被隔离在生命树上，因此是这种遗传信息的唯一传递者(海象和山狸是加拿大最好的例子)。我们可以把这些孤独的物种看作是特别的“独特的”和独特的，作为评估生物多样性要素的许多方法之一。该提案提出了一系列需要回答的问题：衡量进化独特性的最有力、最灵活和最直接的方法是什么？独特的物种预计会在哪些方面有所不同，它们又在哪些方面有所不同？加拿大最有特色的物种是什么？最后，也是重要的一点，加拿大人目前是如何给予个别物种价值的？所有这些问题的答案应该有助于我们欣赏和保护我们的生物遗产。

We would like to offer theoretical underpining and practical guidance for how we might best preserve evolutionary history in the face of imminent extinction. Every time a species goes extinct, the interacting complex of genes that it embodies dies with it. Some species have many close relatives, and so there is a lot of redundancy in this history (think of different mice species), while others are isolated on the Tree of Life and so are the sole conveyers of this genetic information (the Walrus and mountain beavers are prime Canadian examples). We can think of these lonely species as being particularly 'distinctive' and distinctiveness as one of many ways to value the elements of biodiversity. The proposal sets out a series of questions that need to be answered: what are the most robust, flexible and straightforward ways to measure evolutionary distinctiveness? In what ways are distinctive species expected to be different, and in what ways are they different? Which species are the most distinctive in Canada? Finally, and importantly, how do Canadians currently give value to individual species? Answers to all these questions should help us appreciate and safeguard our biological heritage.