Summary
One of the central goals of biology is to explain how and why species evolve. In this research, the researchers study waterfowl to understand how adaptations related to diet have contributed to the evolution of this group of birds. Many waterfowl have independently evolved similar characteristics to support specific feeding strategies (e.g., filter feeding, underwater diving, grazing). These repeated evolutionary changes provide an ideal opportunity to study how organisms evolve, to illuminate the function of specific traits, to understand how genomic change connects to trait change, and to te
