Molecular Evolution Activities
 

This is a comprehensive bibliography (under construction) of primary and secondary sources on the neutral theory of molecular evolution. It currently covers the period 1973-2001.

Author :

Bickel, D. R.;West, B. J.

Year :

1998

Title :

Molecular evolution modeled as a fractal renewal point process in agreement with the dispersion of substitutions in mammalian genes

Journal :

Journal of Molecular Evolution

Volume :

47

Issue :

5

Pages :

551-556

Date :

Nov

Short Title :

Molecular evolution modeled as a fractal renewal point process in agreement with the dispersion of s

Alternate Journal :

J. Mol. Evol.

Custom 2 :

ISI:000076739900006

Abstract :

A fractal renewal point process (FRPP) is used to model molecular evolution in agreement with the relationship between the variance and the mean numbers of nonsynonymous and synonymous substitutions in mammals. Like other episodic models such as the doubly stochastic Poisson process, this model accounts for the large variances observed in amino acid substitution rates, but unlike certain other episodic models, it also accounts for the increase in the index of dispersion with the mean number of substitutions in Ohta's (1995) data. We find that this correlation is significant for nonsynonymous substitutions at the 1% level and for synonymous substitutions at the 10% level, even after removing lineage effects and when using Bulmer's (1989) unbiased estimator of the index of dispersion. This model is simpler than most other overdispersed models of evolution in the sense that it is fully specified by a single interevent probability distribution. Interpretations in terms of chaotic dynamics and in terms of chance and selection are discussed.

Notes :

Times Cited: 4 134JN J MOL EVOL
 -- contributed by John Beatty, March 29, 2002