Year: 2011
Type: article
Abstract: In biological evolution, adaptations to one environment can in some cases reverse adaptations to another environment. To study this “reverse evolution” on a genotypic level, we measured the fitness of E. coli strains with each possible combination of five mutations in an antibiotic-resistance gene in two distinct antibiotic environments. While adaptations to one environment generally lower fitness in the other, we find that reverse evolution is rarely possible and falls as the complexity of adaptations increases, suggesting a probabilistic, molecular form of Dollo’s law.
Institution: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Language: English
Subfield: Genetics
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: green
Funder: National Institutes of Health
Award: G738160294
OpenAlex ID: W3103775283