Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Evolutionary genetics

Making the most of redundancy

Nature volume 449, pages 673–674 (2007)Cite this article

Single genes, chromosomal regions and even entire genomes can undergo duplication. What good can come of these extra copies? Evolution seems to use several tricks to take advantage of the situation.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Possible outcomes of gene duplication.

References

  1. Wolfe, K. H. & Shields, D. C. Nature 387, 708–713 (1997).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Koszul, R., Caburet, S., Dujon, B. & Fischer, G. EMBO J. 23, 234–243 (2004).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Scannell, D. R., Byrne, K. P., Gordon, J. L., Wong, S. & Wolfe, K. H. Nature 440, 341–345 (2006).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Hittinger, C. T. & Carroll, S. B. Nature 449, 677–681 (2007).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Force, A. et al. Genetics 151, 1531–1545 (1999).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  6. Wapinski, I., Pfeffer, A., Friedman, N. & Regev, A. Nature 449, 54–61 (2007).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Johnston, M. Microbiol. Rev. 51, 458–476 (1987).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  8. Hickman, M. A. & Rusche, L. N. PLoS Genet. 3, e126 (2007).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Lynch, M. The Origins of Genome Architecture (Sinauer, Sunderland, MA, 2007).

    Google Scholar 

  10. Carroll, S. B. Nature 409, 1102–1109 (2001).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Edward J. Louis is at the Institute of Genetics, Queen's Medical Centre, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2UH, UK. ed.louis@nottingham.ac.uk ,

    Edward J. Louis

Authors
  1. Edward J. Louis
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Louis, E. Making the most of redundancy. Nature 449, 673–674 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/449673a

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/449673a

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing