Watching Evolution in Real Time
At Texas A&M University, new research into yeast cells has resulted in the first direct experimental observations of evolution occurring in real time: Evolutionary process – new evidence emerges.
New evidence from a study of yeast cells has resulted in the most detailed picture of an organism’s evolutionary process to date, says a Texas A&M University chemical engineering professor whose findings provide the first direct evidence of aspects, which up until now have remained mostly theory.
Working with populations of yeast cells, which were color-coded by fluorescent markers, Katy Kao, assistant professor in the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering, and Stanford University colleague Gavin Sherlock were able to evolve the cells while maintaining a visual analysis of the entire process.
Their research, which appears in the December edition of Nature Genetics, shows the evolutionary process to be much more dynamic than initially thought, with multiple beneficial adaptations arising within a population. These adaptations, Kao explained, triggered a competition between these segments, known as “clonal interference.”
Frank says: