Share with others: |
|
Tweet |
Transposable elements are sometimes called "jumping genes." They consist of segments of DNA that can move from one position on a chromosome to another. In 1951, Nobel prize-winning Dr. Barbara McClintock proposed that genes are not fixed on chromosomes, but that they can move around on the chromosome. At first her findings were discarded because they contradicted the genetic concept of the day. Today, her discovery of what she calls transposable elements has an established place in science.

Transposable elements allow antibiotic resistance and increased variation. The genes move because they are part of a small circular auxiliary genome called a plasmid, which enters and leaves the main genome at a specific place where there is a nucleotide sequence that is also present on the plasmid. Other genes move within small fragments of the genome called transposons. Together, transposons and plasmids produce genetic recombinations.
Integration at a new position also transfers the gene to that new position. The repositioning may be random, but occurs at sequence-specific insertion points which means that the process is orderly. The splicing and repositioning is carried out by enzyme systems and involves the transfer of complete information.
Read about the next mechanism, recombination of choromosomes
Read several authors' thoughts on papal Rome's history.
This article highlights quotes from historical and Catholic sources proving the Papacy's aggressive nature.
An Italian mystic. A minister to a British king. An Augustine monk. A Swiss farmer's boy. What do these men have in common? They were used by God in powerful ways to bring about the Protestant Reformation. Enter into the lives of these ordinary people with extraordinary stories.
Inspiration for these articles comes from Gideon and Hilda Hagstoz' Heroes of the Reformation