Peppered Moths, an Evolutionary Icon, Are Back

Readers of Evolution News are probably familiar with -- perhaps even bored with -- the classic story of peppered moths. The story lay dormant for several years, but now it's in the news again.

In brief, the classic story is that peppered moths went from being mostly light-colored to being mostly dark-colored ("melanic") during the industrialization of 19th-century England. The shift was called "industrial melanism," and it was attributed to natural selection: Dark-colored moths were supposed...