Evolution: most silent genetic mutations are harmful: (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, June 08, 2022, 22:32 (897 days ago) @ David Turell

Not good news in this new research:

https://phys.org/news/2022-06-silent-genetic-mutations-neutral-broad.html

"Occasionally, single-letter misspellings in the genetic code, known as point mutations, occur. Point mutations that alter the resulting protein sequences are called nonsynonymous mutations, while those that do not alter protein sequences are called silent or synonymous mutations.

"Between one-quarter and one-third of point mutations in protein-coding DNA sequences are synonymous. Ever since the genetic code was cracked, those mutations have generally been assumed to be neutral, or nearly so.

"But in a study scheduled for online publication June 8 in the journal Nature that involved the genetic manipulation of yeast cells in the laboratory, University of Michigan biologists show that most synonymous mutations are strongly harmful.

***

"To their surprise, the researchers found that 75.9% of synonymous mutations were significantly deleterious, while 1.3% were significantly beneficial.

***

"Zhang said the researchers knew beforehand, based on the anecdotal reports, that some synonymous mutations would likely turn out to be nonneutral.

"'But we were shocked by the large number of such mutations," he said. "Our results imply that synonymous mutations are nearly as important as nonsynonymous mutations in causing disease and call for strengthened effort in predicting and identifying pathogenic synonymous mutations.'"

Comment: dhw and I long ago threw out chance mutations as causes of evolution. That leaves us with not knowing how speciation occurs. I rely on God. dhw has his own veriouis theories.