Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 1
The Nilgiri Hills in southern Tamil Nadu state nurture forests at their base, provid-
ing protection for some of India's most endangered ecosystems. Their wet uplands also give
refuge to some of India's oldest human tribes. The hills serve as a bridge between the history
of our species and the history of the natural world.
ancestors. We will go to a little valley in northern Israel, to probe the fac-
tors that drive evolution—mutation, natural selection, chance events, and
genetic recombination—and see how these processes bring about the emer-
gence of new species.
We will encounter an earthquake that recently hammered me while div-
ing on a coral reef of the island of Yap, and expand our view of that local
event to take in the multitude of catastrophes large and small that have
shaped the fragile crust of the planet. And we will explore how such geologi-
cal events have shaped evolution in unexpected ways.
Immersing ourselves in the teeming life of rainforests, we will see how
the process of evolution has maintained complex ecosystems over time, and
how evolutionary forces have caused rainforests species to become more
