{"id":7952,"date":"2015-12-09T15:26:01","date_gmt":"2015-12-09T14:26:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/?p=7952"},"modified":"2015-12-09T15:26:01","modified_gmt":"2015-12-09T14:26:01","slug":"evolution-is-not-by-chance-alone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/sciencesurf\/2015\/12\/evolution-is-not-by-chance-alone\/","title":{"rendered":"Evolution is not by chance alone"},"content":{"rendered":"

Evolution isn’t down to chance alone, the New Scientist<\/a> has been reviewing last year “Arrival of the fittest” by Andreas Wagner. Just by sheer numbers<\/p>\n

The problem is that the library is so vast … that the odds of evolution stumbling across the specific \u201cbook\u201d it needs … are practically zero. Something else must guide evolution through the library.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And Wagner tells us that<\/p>\n

many different proteins can perform the same function\u00a0…\u00a0the structure of the library makes it easy for evolution to move from one meaningful book to another. When Wagner and his colleagues tried browsing adjacent \u201cbooks\u201d \u2013 proteins that differ by a single amino acid \u2013 they found that most worked just as well as the original. … In fact, you could move, step by step, from one end of the library to the other without changing the meaning.<\/p>\n

This allows populations to accumulate a lot of genetic variation while still remaining viable. In Wagner\u2019s metaphor, readers spread into many different rooms of the library. And that\u2019s where the big pay-off comes. By wandering far afield, you come to rooms with very different sorts of books nearby. In real terms, you end up in places where changing just a few more amino acids gives you a protein with a radically different function \u2013 an evolutionary breakthrough, close at hand.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So any genetic variation in humans has been mainly mapped for diseases (with minor success). Maybe genetic variation should be mapped for gain of function?<\/p>\n\n

 <\/p>\n

\n CC-BY-NC Science Surf , accessed 10.04.2026<\/span>\n <\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Evolution isn’t down to chance alone, the New Scientist has been reviewing last year “Arrival of the fittest” by Andreas Wagner. Just by sheer numbers The problem is that the library is so vast … that the odds of evolution stumbling across the specific \u201cbook\u201d it needs … are practically zero. Something else must guide … Continue reading Evolution is not by chance alone<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genetics-biology","category-computer-software"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7952"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7952\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7954,"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7952\/revisions\/7954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wjst.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}