Related papers: Evolution of the Ubiquitin-Activating Enzyme Uba1 …
Influenza virus contains two highly variable envelope glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA). The structure and properties of HA, which is responsible for binding the virus to the cell that is being infected, change…
Influenza virus contains two highly variable envelope glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA). The structure and properties of HA, which is responsible for binding the virus to the cell that is being infected, change…
Determination of functions for poorly characterized genes is crucial for understanding biological processes and studying human diseases. Functionally associated genes are often gained and lost together through evolution. Therefore…
The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infects more than 90% of the human population, and is the cause of several both serious and mild diseases. It is a tumorivirus, and has been widely studied as a model system for gene (de)regulation in human. A…
Viruses and their hosts are involved in an 'arms race' where they continually evolve mechanisms to overcome each other. It has long been proposed that intrinsic disorder provides a substrate for the evolution of viral hijack functions and…
The evolutionary transition to multicellularity transformed life on earth, allowing for the evolution of large, complex organisms. While multicellularity can be strongly advantageous, its earliest stages bring unique physical challenges.…
How the very first nervous systems evolved remains a fundamental open question. Molecular and genomic techniques have revolutionized our knowledge of the molecular ingredients behind this transition but not yet provided a clear picture of…
The incubation period of a disease is the time between an initiating pathologic event and the onset of symptoms. For typhoid fever, polio, measles, leukemia and many other diseases, the incubation period is highly variable. Some affected…
One of the major characteristics of living organisms is metabolic rate, which is the amount of energy produced per unit of time. When the mass of organisms increases, the metabolic rate also increases (usually as a power function of mass),…
We investigate the final stage of cytokinesis in two types of amoeba, pointing out the existence of biphasic furrow contraction. The first phase is characterized by a constant contraction rate, is better studied, and seems universal to a…
Mechanically induced protein unfolding in the force-clamp apparatus is shown, in a coarse-grained model of ubiquitin, to have lognormal statistics above a treshold force and exponential below it. Correspondingly, the mean unfolding time is…
We investigate the evolutionary processes behind the development and optimization of multiple threads of execution in digital organisms using the avida platform, a software package that implements Darwinian evolution on populations of…
Since its emergence in 1968, influenza A (H3N2) has evolved extensively in genotype and antigenic phenotype. Antigenic evolution occurs in the context of a two-dimensional 'antigenic map', while genetic evolution shows a characteristic…
Antibiotic resistance is a growing public health problem. To gain a fundamental understanding of resistance evolution, a combination of systematic experimental and theoretical approaches is required. Evolution experiments combined with…
We study a model for the gel degradation by an enzyme, where the gel is schematized as a cubic lattice, and the enzyme as a random walker, that cuts the bonds over which it passes. The model undergoes a (reverse) percolation transition,…
The evolution of structure in biology is driven by accretion and change. Accretion brings together disparate parts to form bigger wholes. Change provides opportunities for growth and innovation. Here we review patterns and processes that…
When our immune system encounters foreign antigens (i.e., from pathogens), the B cells that produce our antibodies undergo a cyclic process of proliferation, mutation, and selection, improving their ability to bind to the specific antigen.…
Emergence of new protein structures has proved difficult to trace in nature and engineer in the laboratory. However, one aspect of structure evolution has proved immensely helpful for determining the three-dimensional structure of proteins…
The origin and early evolution of eukaryotes are one of the major transitions in the evolution of life on earth. One of its most interesting aspects is the emergence of cellular organelles, their dynamics, their functions, and their…
Bedau has developed a general set of evolutionary statistics that quantify the adaptive component of evolutionary processes. On the basis of these measures, he has proposed a set of 4 classes of evolutionary system. All artificial life…