The paper started with a premise that insects did evolve from being simple organisms that move by crawling and other usual means of mobility, to one with wings and having the ability to fly. According to the proponents of the study the ability to fly was needed to increase their access to resources, locate mates and escape predators and by doing so has undoubtedly contributed to their tremendous success (McCulloch, Wallis, & Waters, 4073). Then based on review of literature they went on to say that even if it was advantageous for insects to fly this ability was lost repeatedly (McCulloch, Wallis, & Waters, 4073). The process of flight loss was attributed to the reduction in wing length and it was believed to be due to the high energy expenditure required to produce and maintain wings. The proponents of the study went on further to say that insects had to evolve once again into a simpler organism – minus flight – in order to increase their ability to reproduce while at the same time flightless males are known to acquire more mates and thus father more offspring (McCulloch, Wallis, & Waters, 4073). The assumption regarding evolution to more complex insects and then going back again to being flightless must be accepted first before this study can proceed. Based on this idea and the observation that the absence of flight is beneficial to some species of stoneflies the researchers asked the question if insects lose flight before they lose their wings. The problem is complicated by the fact that there are three kinds of flightless stoneflies. The first group is comprised of those who have fully formed wings (macropterous). The second group is comprised of those with smaller-sized wins (micropterous). And the third group is comprised of stoneflies that do not have wings (apterous). One can only be certain of one thing at this point and it is the conclusion that the presence of wings does not determine flight. Thus, the researchers hypothesized that the deterioration of flight muscle is the reason why these species of stoneflies lost its ability to fly. The greater challenge is to devise the methodology to find out with certainty that this is the case. The research design required a lot of work but the goal was relatively simple. It is to compare the genetic differentiation between those that have strong flight capacity ( Z. deocrata ) and those that are flightless or have reduced flight ( Z. pennulata, and Z. fenestrata ). At this point the researchers went a little further and stated that due to high rate of dispersal of flight-capable insects their genetic variation is less compared to those with limited dispersal capability (McCulloch, Wallis, & Waters, 4075). These groupings were simplified into two: 1) the Z. decorata group and 2) the fenesrata species group. They followed standard protocol when it comes to collecting insects belonging to each group making sure that each group is well represented. DNA was extracted, amplified and sequenced for further analysis (McCulloch, Wallis, & Waters, 4075). They also used standard software and other laboratory procedures used to achieve accurate DNA sequencing. Based on this methodology the proponents of the said study were able to determine that fo