The visual pigments of vertebrates evolved about 500 million years ago, before the major
evolutionary step of the development of jaws. Four spectrally distinct classes of cone opsin …

The jawless fish that were ancestral to all living vertebrates had four spectral cone types that
were probably served by chromatic-opponent retinal circuits. Subsequent evolution of …

Theoretically, divergent selection on sensory systems can cause speciation through sensory
drive. However, empirical evidence is rare and incomplete. Here we demonstrate sensory …

A comprehensive treatment of visual ecology Visual ecology is the study of how animals use
visual systems to meet their ecological needs, how these systems have evolved, and how …

Among vertebrates, teleost eye diversity exceeds that found in all other groups. Their
spectral sensitivities range from ultraviolet to red, and the number of visual pigments varies …

In craniates, opsin‐based photopigments expressed in the eye encode molecular 'light
sensors' that constitute the initial protein in photoreception and the activation of the …

It has been 25 years since the formalization of the Sensory Drive hypothesis was published
in the American Naturalist (1992). Since then, there has been an explosion of research …

The evolution of cone opsin genes is characterized by a dynamic process of gene birth and
death through gene duplication and loss. However, the forces governing the retention and …

Divergent natural selection acting on ecological traits, which also affect mate choice, is a key
element of ecological speciation theory, but has not previously been demonstrated at the …

Genes vary greatly in their long-term phylogenetic stability and there exists no general
explanation for these differences. The cytochrome P450 (CYP450) gene superfamily is well …