Molecular evolutionary force

Transposable elements as molecular evolutionary force (Fedoroff, 1999). It has been estimated that a third of the human genome consists of repetitive sequences, mostly transposons and retrotransposons. Selective pressure appears to cause... 

Vitalism occupied the epistemological gap in life science that began to close definitively only with the emergence in molecular genetics of a theory that finally clarified the mechanisms that sorted and ordered material elements into living organisms, that produced the invariant replication of species, and that enabled the retention of evolutionary variations as they randomly arose. The doctrine of the life force began with the reasonable idea that the new chemistry of its... 

We have pursued a plug-and-play strategy with two different energy functions, a molecular mechanics AMBER force field [131,132] and a simplified energy function, along with two different sampling techniques, evolutionary programming [91] and Monte Carlo simulations [118,119,127,128]. 

Our view is rather discordant. Since characters evolve at different rates, and are subjected to different forces producing either constant or variable evolutionary rates, conflictual results should be expected. In addition, as more and more comparative studies will become available, conflict is expected to occur as a common outcome even among sets of characters of the same nature, either morphological or molecular. 

Dynamic, or evolutionary simulation random or Newtonian paths are followed to sample a significant portion of phase space, on which averages can Ije taken (as in ordinary molecular dynamics or Monte Carlo) or to force somehow the access to entropy (free energy simulations). Temperature and pressure can be varied. 

The exploration for evolutionary changes in the molecular constituents of sediments rests on the principal assumption that evolutionary developments in life on Earth should be matched by biochemical changes that can be expected to survive in the geological record. This presumption is predicated on a number of other assumptions which need to be considered, and undoubtedly complicate the assessment and interpretation of the molecular records contained in sediments. However, it can be forcefully argued that such potential constraints do not invalidate the approach. 

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