Extinction or evolution? The answer isn’t always clear

Smithsonian Magazine featured research by Seth Rudman, a UBC zoology PhD candidate, who authored a study about two species of stickleback fish which merged into one species.

“Whether they went back to being an ancestral species is debatable,” Rudman said. “Their ecological role is slightly shifted from the earlier species. It’s really hard to say if they’re going all the way back, but it might be following that path.”