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DNA Mutations Are Not Random: New Research Radically Changes Our Understanding of Evolution - SciTechDaily

DNA Mutations Are Not Random: New Research Radically Changes Our Understanding of Evolution - SciTechDaily

DNA Mutations Are Not Random: New Research Radically Changes Our Understanding of Evolution - SciTechDaily
Jan 22, 2022 1 min, 19 secs

By University of California - Davis.

January 22, 2022.

A simple roadside weed may hold the key to understanding and predicting DNA mutation, according to new research from University of California, Davis, and the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Germany.

“We always thought of mutation as basically random across the genome,” said Grey Monroe, an assistant professor in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences who is lead author on the paper.

“At first glance, what we found seemed to contradict established theory that initial mutations are entirely random and that only natural selection determines which mutations are observed in organisms,” said Detlef Weigel, scientific director at Max Planck Institute and senior author on the study.

Instead of randomness they found patches of the genome with low mutation rates.

“It means we can predict which genes are more likely to mutate than others and it gives us a good idea of what’s going on,” Weigel said.

The findings add a surprising twist to Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection because it reveals that the plant has evolved to protect its genes from mutation to ensure survival.

“The plant has evolved a way to protect its most important places from mutation,” Weigel said.

“Our discoveries yield a more complete account of the forces driving patterns of natural variation; they should inspire new avenues of theoretical and practical research on the role of mutation in evolution,” the paper concludes.

Fenster and Detlef Weigel, 12 January 2022, Nature.

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