The quest for adaptive evolution: a theoretical challenge in a maze of data

Curr Opin Plant Biol. 2008 Apr;11(2):110-5. doi: 10.1016/j.pbi.2007.12.003. Epub 2008 Feb 5.

Abstract

Advances in sequencing technology have brought opportunities to refine our searches for adaptive evolution and to address and identify new questions regarding how adaptive evolution has shaped genomic diversity. Recent theoretical developments incorporate demographic and complex selective histories into tests of non-neutral evolution, thereby significantly improving our power to detect selection. These analyses combined with large data sets promise to identify targets of selection for which there was no a priori expectation. Moreover, they contribute to elucidate the role selection has played in shaping diversity in transposable elements, conserved noncoding DNA, gene family size, and other multicopy features of genomes.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.
  • Review

MeSH terms

  • Adaptation, Physiological / genetics*
  • Biological Evolution*
  • Models, Genetic*
  • Selection, Genetic