Tagged Questions
1
vote
2answers
24 views
How did the activities of protocells become inheritable?
I have learned that first a protocell came to exist and its characteristics came to be passed on by genetic material. So how come genes for all the activities come to incorporate into genetic ...
7
votes
2answers
218 views
Why doesn't recombination occur in male Drosophila?
"Males do not show meiotic recombination, facilitating genetic studies."
For a while I have known that this phenomenon occurs, this quote comes from the Wikipedia page on Drosophila melanogaster, ...
8
votes
2answers
88 views
How can a three-base codon evolve from a two-base codon?
Inspired by this question among others.
It's widely suggested that the current 3-base codon system of encoding protein sequences in DNA evolved from an earlier 2-base codon system. This makes sense ...
7
votes
3answers
129 views
Mathematical Modelling of Natural Selection
I'm a math undergrad looking for some papers on modelling the process of natural selection. The only paper I've been able to find is by the pre-eminent mathematician Herbert Wilf from 2010,
There's ...
2
votes
1answer
42 views
Historical recovery from mass extinction events
Is there a way to generally characterize how species "regrew" after the various mass extinction events happening periodically from 450 Ma to 65 Ma. Would the surviving species just start back where ...
3
votes
1answer
140 views
Chromosome 2 fusion?
I read this article by Jeffrey Tomkins and Jerry Bergman claiming to debunk chromosome 2 fusion. Is there anything wrong with these conclusions?
" 1.The reputed fusion site is located in a ...
1
vote
3answers
1k views
Evolutionally speaking, why do humans have 46 chromosomes
In humans, each cell normally contains 23 pairs of chromosomes, for a total of 46. Monkeys, chimpanzees, and Apes have 24 pairs (twenty-four pairs), for a total of 48.
What caused humans to have 46?
...
2
votes
3answers
141 views
Why don't flies avoid the motorway?
Flies have a short lifespan, therefore evolution should technically happen over a shorter period of time (years).
Flies die all the time from getting hit by cars on the motorway.
Those flies that ...
4
votes
3answers
752 views
Is the theory of evolution being disproved by bats?
For some species the Darwin's theory evolution makes perfect sense. I can easily imagine how, for example, the giraffe has evolved to its current appearance: the natural selection was favoring ...
8
votes
2answers
110 views
Is there an “evolutionary species similarity calculator”?
Is there a website where I can input pairs of species and get an "evolutionary similarity score"?
E.g. (numbers are completely made up)
Input: Chimp and Human, Output: 97%
Input: Cat and Human, ...
4
votes
3answers
930 views
How does Artificial Selection work?
As far as I know for evolution to work mutations are necessary. Mutations are the raw material on which natural selection works.
But mutations are always completely random and human beings have no ...
20
votes
4answers
518 views
Why do men have nipples?
I'd be tempted to call nipples in men vestigial, but that suggests they have no modern function. They do have a function, of course, but only in women. So why do men (and all male mammals) have them?
...
8
votes
2answers
185 views
Are there differences in DNA between humans of today and humans from 2000 years ago?
Are there any significant differences in our genome compared to the genes of our ancestors from 1000-2000 years ago?
And if there are significant differences, do they result in significant ...
13
votes
4answers
653 views
Can two humans with 44 chromosomes produce viable offspring?
It is known that there are very few individuals having 44 chromosomes, not the usual 46 chromosomes.
One example is a male in China: the first article, the second article.
The other is a female in ...
12
votes
2answers
217 views
Is there any reason for the variation in mitochondrial DNA size?
As my textbook An Introduction to Genetic Analysis points out, yeast mitochondrial DNA has approximately 78 kb of genetic data, while the human mitochondrial DNA contains 17 kb. Is there any evolution ...
11
votes
1answer
197 views
How do members of cryptic species know who to mate with?
According to Wikipedia:
In biology, a cryptic species complex is a group of species which
satisfy the biological definition of species—that is, they are
reproductively isolated from each ...
28
votes
4answers
2k views
Why 20 amino acids instead of 64?
This question got me thinking about amino acids and the ambiguity in the genetic code. With 4 nucleotides in RNA and 3 per codon, there are 64 codons. However, these 64 codons only code for 20 amino ...
