Using Sex to Cure the Genome | Zendy

Eduardo P. C. Rocha | Zendy

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Using Sex to Cure the Genome

Author(s) -

Eduardo P. C. Rocha

Publication year - 2016

Publication title -

plos biology

Language(s) - English

Resource type - Journals

SCImago Journal Rank - 4.127

H-Index - 271

eISSN - 1545-7885

pISSN - 1544-9173

DOI - 10.1371/journal.pbio.1002417

Subject(s) - biology , genome , mobile genetic elements , computational biology , genetics , dna , evolutionary biology , human genome , gene

The diversification of prokaryotes is accelerated by their ability to acquire DNA from other genomes. However, the underlying processes also facilitate genome infection by costly mobile genetic elements. The discovery that cells can uptake DNA by natural transformation was instrumental to the birth of molecular biology nearly a century ago. Surprisingly, a new study shows that this mechanism could efficiently cure the genome of mobile elements acquired through previous sexual exchanges.

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