Crustaceans, due to the great diversity of their body organization, segmentation patterns, tagmatization, limb types, larval forms, cleavage, and gastrulation modes, are highly desirable for the study of questions at the interface of evolution and development. Modern interest in evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) rests on the molecular genetic approach and a variety of molecular techniques have proven fruitful when performed on crustaceans.
Evolutionary Developmental Biology of Crustacea presents a comprehensive treatment of all aspects of the field, beginning with a discussion of the implications of the typological Bauplan and phylum concepts versus historical concepts such as ground pattern and monophylum for the formulation of conceptual questions in evo-devo. Following this, the authors present the results of Hox gene expression in various crustacean taxa, aspects of segment formation at the cellular and genetic levels, the formation of segmental structures such as neurons, ganglia, and limbs, and the role of morphological ontogenetic characters in resolving phylogenetic relationships.
By covering so many general aspects of crustacean development, morphology, and evolution, Evolutionary Developmental Biology of Crustacea serves as an indispensable reference for developmental and evolutionary biologists investigating the role of genetics in evolution and development.

In his 1894 book, Materials for the Study of Variation, William Bateson coined the term Homoeosis with the following prose: The case of the modification of the antenna of an insect into a foot, of the eye of a Crustacean into an antenna, of a petal into a stamen, and the like, are examples of the same kind. It is desirable and indeed necessary that such Variations, which consist in the assumption by one member of a Meristic series, of the form or characters proper to other members of the series, should be recognized as constituting a distinct group of phenomena. ...I therefore propose...the term HOMOEOSIS...; for the essential phenomenon is not that there has merely been a change, but that something has been changed into the likeness of something else. The book was intended as a listing of the kinds of naturally occurring variation that could act as a substrate for the evolutionary process and Bateson took his examples from collections, both private and in museums, of materials displaying morphological oddities. Interestingly the person who also coined the term "Genetics" proffered little in the way of speculation on the possible genetic underpinnings of these oddities. It wasn't until the early part of the next century that these changes in meristic series were shown to be heritable.