The same host–virus interactions can evolve multiple times in nature, due to the high effective mutation rate of viruses, and provide interesting systems of study.
Development from dual-origin mesenchyme with common competence explains anatomical parallels and shared patterning of the jawed vertebrate gill arch and paired fin skeletons.
A disease-associated polymorphism in a related protein that regulates neurotransmitter release reveals that antiviral protein IFITM3 forms oligomers to rigidify membranes and inhibit virus fusion with cells.
A bacterial tRNA gene set rapidly evolves, compensating the loss of one tRNA type by large duplication events that increase the gene copy number of a second, different tRNA type.
A novel, overlapping, putatively functional gene in SARS-CoV-2, ORF3d, is absent from close relatives of SARS-CoV-2 and may have contributed to the biology, emergence, or spread of the virus.
Bhavatharini Kasinathan, Serafin U Colmenares III ... Harmit S Malik
Heterochromatic sequences evolve rapidly, as do ZAD-ZNF genes-encoding proteins involved in heterochromatin functions, explaining why evolutionarily dynamic ZAD-ZNF genes are more likely to be essential in Drosophila.
Enrico Sandro Colizzi, Renske MA Vroomans, Roeland MH Merks
Selection for undifferentiated multicellularity emerges in an evolutionary cell-based model because a collective of cells performs chemotaxis better than single cells in a noisy environment.
A novel assay to measure 2-micron stability together with a survey of natural variation among Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains reveals novel means by which yeasts can combat the parasitic 2-micron plasmids.
Similar evolutionary pressures on gene expression between human and chimpanzee populations contribute to the observation that inter-individual gene expression variability is similar across genes in these species.
A systematic experimental comparison of prosocial behavior in eight corvid species reveals sex-specific effects of cooperative breeding and colonial nesting, thereby adding important new insights regarding the evolution of prosociality.
