These Raja Ampat Islands are thought to have the greatest marine diversity on earth. By exploring islands like these in the Malay Archipelago (modern day Indonesia), Alfred Russell Wallace (the “father of biogeography") discovered the Wallace Line and crafted a theory of evolution by natural selection. Biogeography can play a similarly important role in the search for underlying drivers of economic development.
<a href="//doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001457.g001" class="extiw" title="doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001457.g001">doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001457.g001</a>
Jonathan Chase
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Chase J (2012) Which Came First: Burden of Infectious Disease or Poverty? PLoS Biol 10(12): e1001457. <a href="//doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001457" class="extiw" title="doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001457">doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001457</a>