Abstract
An emerging synthesis of evolutionary biology and experimental molecular biology is providing much stronger and deeper inferences about the dynamics and mechanisms of evolution than were possible in the past. The new approach combines statistical analyses of gene sequences with manipulative molecular experiments to reveal how ancient mutations altered biochemical processes and produced novel phenotypes. This functional synthesis has set the stage for major advances in our understanding of fundamental questions in evolutionary biology. Here we describe this emerging approach, highlight important new insights that it has made possible, and suggest future directions for the field.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 675-688 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| Journal | Nature Reviews Genetics |
| Volume | 8 |
| Issue number | 9 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Sep 2007 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:We thank M. Borello, M. Travisano, P. Phillips, B. Cresko, P. Rainey, A. Kondrashov, S. Yokoyama, R. Newcomb, D.Weinreich, B. Hall, an anonymous referee and members of the Thornton and Dean laboratories for comments. Supported by the US National Science Foundation (NSF IOB-0546906), the US National Institutes of Health (NIH R01-GM081592), and a Sloan Foundation Fellowship to J.W.T. and NIH R01-GM060,611 to A.M.D.