Charles Darwin
“In the long history of human kind (and animal kind too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most efficiently have prevailed.” CHARLES DARWIN
Charles Darwin, one of the world's most important scientists, was born on 12 February 1809, and 200 years later his work is still as significant as ever. Darwin shows us how nature works, how humans fit in, and why it is important to help save the living world from the harm we cause.
In 1831, aged 22, Darwin joined HMS Beagle on its voyage to map the South American mainland. Over the next five years, he circumnavigated the globe, visiting many islands and mainland countries. During this voyage, Darwin's observations of rock formations and fossils and his experience of earthquakes led him to contemplate the age of the earth. His studies of plants and animals in different locations suggested to him that species might change.
On returning home to England, Darwin married and in 1842 moved to Down House in Kent. There he continued his investigations into the natural world. In his ground-breaking On the Origin of Species, Darwin explained his theory of evolution through natural selection. His last book, on earthworms, was published a year before his death, aged 73, in 1882.
WHY IS DARWIN RELEVANT TODAY?
These themes and Darwinian ideas can be seen in one of the most startling examples of evolution in our lifetime, the current Swine Flu H1N1 pandemic. New influenza viruses can be generated in two ways. The viruses’ own photocopying mechanism (replication) introduces random errors into its genome sequence, generating differences upon which natural selection can act (genetic drift). This led to the ‘Spanish flu’ pandemic of 1918 where a bird virus acquired the ability to transmit effectively between people: a case of the same virus becoming lethally different, causing 80 million deaths.
Secondly, with flu infecting many animals, scientists believe that pigs may have acted as a mixing bowl for a potentially lethal cocktail of human, bird and swine viruses. Since the Spanish flu pandemic, three influenza pandemics, including the present one, have been caused by the mixing (recombination) of genes from different viruses – the past influencing all our futures.
These changes mean that when a new strain appears in human populations there is no pre-existing immunity, and so the virus is not recognised as something our bodies have seen before and it is effectively concealed allowing it to spread quickly because of its camouflage. With the potential for further recombination events and some varieties of H1N1 becoming resistant to the drugs used to control it, H1N1 remains the focus of scientific attention.
Image credit: Reconstruction of Charles Darwin aged 16 -18, developed by Elisabeth Daynès for the Gulbenkian Foundation exhibition Darwin's Evolution. © 2009 Photo: S. Plaille/ E. Daynès - Reconstruction Atelier Daynès Paris