Linked Life Data

20624179

Source:http://linkedlifedata.com/resource/pubmed/id/20624179

Statements in which the resource exists as a subject.
PredicateObject
rdf:type
lifeskim:mentions
pubmed:issue
11
pubmed:dateCreated
2010-10-27
pubmed:abstractText
The earliest organisms are thought to have had high mutation rates. It has been asserted that these high mutation rates would have severely limited the information content of early genomes. This has led to a well-known “paradox” because, in contemporary organisms, the mechanisms that suppress mutations are quite complex and a substantial amount of information is required to construct these mechanisms. The paradox arises because it is not clear how efficient error-suppressing mechanisms could have evolved, and thus allowed the evolution of complex organisms, at a time when mutation rates were too high to permit the maintenance of very substantial amounts of information within genomes. Here, we use concepts from the formal theory of information to calculate the amount of genomic information that can be maintained. We identify conditions under which much higher levels of genomic information can be maintained than previously considered possible among origin-of-life researchers. In particular, we find that the highest levels of information are maintained when many genotypes produce identical phenotypes, and when reproduction occasionally involves recombination between multiple parental genomes. There is a good reason to believe that these conditions are relevant for very early organisms, and thus the results presented may provide a solution to a long-standing logical problem associated with the early evolution of life.
pubmed:language
eng
pubmed:journal
pubmed:citationSubset
IM
pubmed:status
MEDLINE
pubmed:month
Nov
pubmed:issn
1558-5646
pubmed:author
pubmed:issnType
Electronic
pubmed:volume
64
pubmed:owner
NLM
pubmed:authorsComplete
Y
pubmed:pagination
3300-9
pubmed:meshHeading
pubmed:year
2010
pubmed:articleTitle
Is life impossible? Information, sex, and the origin of complex organisms.
pubmed:affiliation
School of Life Sciences, The University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QG, United Kingdom. J.R.Peck@sussex.ac.uk
pubmed:publicationType
Journal Article, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't