American scientists have succeeded in developing a mouse that encodes a gene that was common 500 million years ago. From the outside, by the way, it looks like an ordinary mouse
Avi Blizovsky
Researchers from the USA took mice and traced their evolution back about 500 million years. By engineering the genetic blueprint of the mice, they were able to reconstruct a gene that existed in primitive animals.
The ancient gene subsequently mutated and split, and finally it is expressed today in a pair of genes that play an important role in the development of the brain in modern mammals. The scientists say the experiment sheds light on the way evolution works and could lead to new gene therapy techniques.
"We are the first to engineer and rebuild an ancient garden" said one of the researchers, Petr Tvrdik from the University of Utah, one of the researchers in the project. "We proved that with two modern specialized genes we can rebuild the ancient gene from which they split." He said and added that "this illustrates the mechanisms and processes that evolution uses and tell us more about the way nature engineers life." said.
The genetic medicine expert
For news at the BBC
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