ReviewTrends in genetics : TIG2010
Robustness and evolvability.
Review in Trends in genetics : TIG, 2010. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 112 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
112 citing papers in PubMed.
- Wanted: A population genetic theory of biological noise regulation.PLoS genetics · 2026Article
- Gim3 buffers and potentiates de novo mutations that affect fluconazole susceptibility in yeast.EMBO reports · 2026Article
- Reducing the sensitivity of Halomonas sp. to oxygen availability through adaptive laboratory evolution.Microbial cell factories · 2026Article
- Factors controlling protein evolvability-at the molecular scale.European biophysics journal : EBJ · 2026Article
- Article
- Dispersal evolution can only rescue a limited set of species from climate change.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Macroevolution along developmental lines of least resistance in fly wings.Nature ecology & evolution · 2025Article
- Biological detail and graph structure in network neuroscience.Frontiers in network physiology · 2025Review
- Data-driven discovery of the interplay between genetic and environmental factors in bacterial growth.Communications biology · 2024Article
- The Role of Pleiotropy and Epistasis on Evolvability and Robustness in a Two-Peak Fitness Landscape.Biology · 2024Article
- Understanding species-specific and conserved RNA-protein interactions in vivo and in vitro.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Mapping the dynamics of epigenetic adaptation in S. pombe during heterochromatin misregulation.Developmental cell · 2024Article
- Mutational robustness and the role of buffer genes in evolvability.The EMBO journal · 2024Review
- Genetic code robustness and protein evolvability are correlated and protein-specific.PLoS biology · 2024Article
- Understanding species-specific and conserved RNA-protein interactionsbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- Evolvability: filling the explanatory gap between adaptedness and the long-term mathematical conception of fitness.Biology & philosophy · 2024Article
- Competition and evolutionary selection among core regulatory motifs in gene expression control.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Sexual conflict, heterochrony and tissue specificity as evolutionary problems of adaptive plasticity in development.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Review
- The effect of mutational robustness on the evolvability of multicellular organisms and eukaryotic cells.Journal of evolutionary biology · 2023Article
- The ensemble of gene regulatory networks at mutation-selection balance.Journal of the Royal Society, Interface · 2023Article
52 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Why isn't random variation always deleterious? Are there factors that sometimes make adaptation easier? Biological systems are extraordinarily robust to perturbation by mutations, recombination and the environment. It has been proposed that this robustness might make them more evolvable. Robustness to mutation allows genetic variation to accumulate in a cryptic state. Switching mechanisms known as evolutionary capacitors mean that the amount of heritable phenotypic variation available can be correlated to the degree of stress and hence to the novelty of the environment and remaining potential for adaptation. There have been two somewhat separate literatures relating robustness to evolvability. One has focused on molecular phenotypes and new mutations, the other on morphology and cryptic genetic variation. Here, we review both literatures, and show that the true distinction is whether recombination rates are high or low. In both cases, the evidence supports the claim that robustness promotes evolvability.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.