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Full-Text Articles in Medical Biochemistry
Epigenetics As An Answer To Darwin’S “Special Difficulty,” Part 2: Natural Selection Of Metastable Epialleles In Honey Bee Castes, Douglas M. Ruden, Pablo E. Cingolani, Arko Sen, Wen Qu, Luan Wang, Marie-Claude Senut, Mark D. Garfinkel, Vincent E. Sollars, Xiangyi Lu
Epigenetics As An Answer To Darwin’S “Special Difficulty,” Part 2: Natural Selection Of Metastable Epialleles In Honey Bee Castes, Douglas M. Ruden, Pablo E. Cingolani, Arko Sen, Wen Qu, Luan Wang, Marie-Claude Senut, Mark D. Garfinkel, Vincent E. Sollars, Xiangyi Lu
Biochemistry and Microbiology
In a recent perspective in this journal, Herb (2014) discussed how epigenetics is a possible mechanism to circumvent Charles Darwin’s “special difficulty” in using natural selection to explain the existence of the sterile-fertile dimorphism in eusocial insects. Darwin’s classic book “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection” explains how natural selection of the fittest individuals in a population can allow a species to adapt to a novel or changing environment. However, in bees and other eusocial insects, such as ants and termites, there exist two or more castes of genetically similar females, from fertile queens to multiple …
Waddington’S Widget: Hsp90 And The Inheritance Of Acquired Characters, Douglas M. Ruden, Mark D. Garfinkel, Vincent E. Sollars, Xiangyi Lu
Waddington’S Widget: Hsp90 And The Inheritance Of Acquired Characters, Douglas M. Ruden, Mark D. Garfinkel, Vincent E. Sollars, Xiangyi Lu
Biochemistry and Microbiology
Conrad Waddington published an influential model for evolution in his 1942 paper, Canalization of Development and Inheritance of Acquired Characters. In this classic, albeit controversial, paper, he proposed that an unknown mechanism exists that conceals phenotypic variation until the organism is stressed. Recent studies have proposed that the highly conserved chaperone Hsp90 could function as a “capacitor,” or an “adaptively inducible canalizer,” that masks silent phenotypic variation of either genetic or epigenetic origin. This review will discuss evidence for, and arguments against, the role of Hsp90 as a capacitor for morphological evolution, and as a key component of what …