Handbook of Statistical Genetics (Balding/Handbook of Statistical Genetics, Third Edition) || Genome Evolution

✍ Scribed by Balding, D. J.; Bishop, M.; Cannings, C.

• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd
• Year: 2008
• Weight: 266 KB
• Edition: 3
• Category: Article
• ISBN: 0470058307
• DOI: 10.1002/9780470061619.ch13

✦ Synopsis

Our understanding of the forces that have shaped the evolution of genome organisation is still largely rudimentary. The process of genome evolution is, in some ways, different in kind from those more typically studied by population and evolutionary geneticists. Firstly, forces of selection that operate at levels different from the individual may be important, as in the spread of selfish intragenomic parasites and in the impact of changes in genome organisation on the ability of lineages to proliferate and diversify. Secondly, alternative genotypes are often not allelic, such that the process of evolutionary change is not necessarily ended by the spread to fixation of a new genetic type. However, some progress can be made in understanding genome evolution. A number of the most controversial issues in genome evolution, such as the evolution of codon bias, the antiquity of introns and the selfishness of mobile DNAs, are reviewed. In addition, the evolutionary forces affecting gene number, linkage between genes, gene expression and the functional overlap between gene products are considered.