Among the synapomorphies of clades such as the
Holometabola among the Insecta and the
Epimorpha among the Chilopoda are characters
of their postembryonic development, holometaboly
(“complete metamorphosis”), and epimorphosis
(postembryonic development without
addition of segments or appendages). Other
“higher” taxa have been tentatively characterized
by the presence of specifi c larval types, e.g., the
trochophore or the tornaria. Larval morphology
is however liable to profound and even rapid
change, up to complete disappearance. EvoDevo
can thus offer a valuable contribution to phylogenetics,
insofar as it can provide reliable scenarios
of the evolvability of larvae and determine the
degree to which larval and adult traits can actually
evolve independently – a property likely to
be different in different major clades of
metazoans.