Influenza evolution navigates stability valleys

Influenza evolution navigates stability valleys

By reconstructing how an influenza protein collected in 1968 might have evolved into one collected in 2007, researchers have obtained new insights into the interactions between genetic mutations.

The pace of evolution across fitness valleys.

How fast does a population evolve from one fitness peak to another? We study the dynamics of evolving, asexually reproducing populations in which a certain number of mutations jointly confer a fitness advantage. We consider the time until a population has evolved from one fitness peak to another one with a higher fitness. The order of mutations can either be fixed or random. If the order of mut...

Stability-mediated epistasis constrains the evolution of an influenza protein

John Maynard Smith compared protein evolution to the game where one word is converted into another a single letter at a time, with the constraint that all intermediates are words: WORD→WORE→GORE→GONE→GENE. In this analogy, epistasis constrains evolution, with some mutations tolerated only after the occurrence of others. To test whether epistasis similarly constrains actual protein evolution, we...

Aquaculture Navigates Through Troubled Waters

Gully Formation and Evolution in the Antarctic Dry Valleys: Implications