ArticleBMC biology2016
Splendor and misery of adaptation, or the importance of neutral null for understanding evolution.
Article in BMC biology, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 47 papers.
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Who cites it
47 citing papers in PubMed.
- Genomic indicators of gene function: a systematic assessment of the human genome.G3 (Bethesda, Md.) · 2026Article
- Pervasive Transcription in the Human Genome Exceeds Background Noise.Genome biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Intraspecific genome size variation is attributed to adaptive silencing of transposable elements in Hordeum species.Molecular biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Convergence and Parallelism of Phenotypic and Molecular Genetic Variability in Some Species.Doklady biological sciences : proceedings of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Biological sciences sections · 2026Article
- Recurrent evolution of selfishness from an essential tRNA synthetase in Caenorhabditis tropicalis.Nature ecology & evolution · 2025Article
- Computational De Novo Design of Group II Introns Yields Highly Active Ribozymes.Chembiochem : a European journal of chemical biology · 2025Article
- Article
- Protein-free catalysis of DNA hydrolysis and self-integration by a ribozyme.Nucleic acids research · 2025Article
- Tonic immobility and phenomenal consciousness in animals: a review.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Review
- Structural heterogeneity and functional convergence of transposable elements.Frontiers in genetics · 2025Article
- Clonal dynamics and somatic evolution of haematopoiesis in mouse.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- The GC-content at the 5' ends of human protein-coding genes is undergoing mutational decay.Genome biology · 2024Article
- Genetic and selective constraints on the optimization of gene product diversity.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- The distribution of fitness effects during adaptive walks using a simple genetic network.PLoS genetics · 2024Article
- Pseudogenes act as a neutral reference for detecting selection in prokaryotic pangenomes.Nature ecology & evolution · 2024Article
- Review
- mRNA nuclear export: how mRNA identity features distinguish functional RNAs from junk transcripts.RNA biology · 2024Review
- Relaxation of Natural Selection in the Evolution of the Giant Lungfish Genomes.Molecular biology and evolution · 2023Article
- The long road of functional recruitment-The evolution of a gene duplicate to pyrrolizidine alkaloid biosynthesis in the morning glories (Convolvulaceae).Plant direct · 2022Article
- Quantifying shifts in natural selection on codon usage between protein regions: a population genetics approach.BMC genomics · 2022Article
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1 author.
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Abstract
The study of any biological features, including genomic sequences, typically revolves around the question: what is this for? However, population genetic theory, combined with the data of comparative genomics, clearly indicates that such a "pan-adaptationist" approach is a fallacy. The proper question is: how has this sequence evolved? And the proper null hypothesis posits that it is a result of neutral evolution: that is, it survives by sheer chance provided that it is not deleterious enough to be efficiently purged by purifying selection. To claim adaptation, the neutral null has to be falsified. The adaptationist fallacy can be costly, inducing biologists to relentlessly seek function where there is none.
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