[Taxacom] Non-coding traits can suffer convergent adaptation

[Bob Mesibov]

I'm not sure 'non-coding traits' is allowable, but in any case I think your extrapolation from E. coli to the broader evolutionary picture might be... umm - premature?

Agreed, the results from prokaryote genetics are truly amazing. Just look at the 18 April entry on 'Small Things Considered', on CRISPRs (http://schaechter.asmblog.org/schaechter/) to get your morning's imagination exercise. But selection might work on different control systems in different sorts of organisms, so that selection operates in different ways, as well. I doubt very much that the genetic mechanisms maintaining the stability of spider phenomes, for example (including web spinning) are analogous to those regulating phage resistance in bacteria.

Please note that I'm not suggesting that the phenome-controlling mechanisms in arthropods are necessarily more complicated than those in bacteria, just because arthropods are more complex. I'm only suggesting that they might work differently, and respond to selection in different ways.
-- 
Dr Robert Mesibov
Honorary Research Associate
Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, and
School of Zoology, University of Tasmania
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