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Fig. 4 | Evolution: Education and Outreach

Fig. 4

From: The Concept of Co-option: Why Evolution Often Looks Miraculous

Fig. 4

The evolution of the 2nd pharyngeal slit in the deuterostomes. Both the phylogenetic tree and the evolutionary story have been very simplified, but this does not change the basic observation that a pair of cartilaginous rods that appeared 900 mya in the 2nd pharyngeal slit were co-opted from their original function in filter feeding to play a role in respiration, predation, and hearing throughout the evolution of the vertebrates. So many different outcomes from one old structure

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