A Galápagos National Park guide searching for Scalesia plants on Santa Cruz Island, Galápagos. Credit: Michael Martin, NTNU A new study reveals how a remarkable group of plants on the Galápagos Islands developed their diverse leaf shapes—offering unique insight into evolution at the genetic level. A large international team of researchers has studied evolution in the plant group Scalesia, also known as the Galápagos giant daisies. The research was recently published in Nature Communications . The researchers are from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; the University of California, Davis; the University of Copenhagen; the Charles Darwin Foundation, Galápagos; the University of Georgia, Athens; the University of British Columbia; and several other institutions. The Galápagos Islands hold an iconic place in the history of evolutionary biology. When Charles Darwin landed there in 1835 during his voyage on the HMS Beagle, he collected birds that he later brought back to England.…