Origin and Evolution of the Vertebrate Telencephalon, with Special Reference to the Mammalian Neocortex

How could a structure as complex as the vertebrate brain develop from the simplest multicellular animals? Natural selection offers an impeccable mechanism for the gradual transformation of species, but even Darwin sometimes expressed doubts about the origin of highly complex structures. Following an approach that has been termed "developmental evolutionary genetics," this book seeks to establish a correspondence between embryological processes and the phylogenetic history of an organism.