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Archived Comments for: Correlates of substitution rate variation in mammalian protein-coding sequences

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  1. Rate variation does not invalidate the equidistance result that supports the constant mutation rate hypothesis

    Shi Huang, The Burnham Institute

    5 February 2009



    There are data as in your nice paper that support rate variation. Rodents have faster mutation rate than the great apes. But there are also data that support constant or similar mutation rate. Thus, all mammals are equidistant to a simpler outgroup such as birds. The constant mutation rate or molecular clock hypothesis was not invented for no reason. It cannot be casually dismissed without a cost. The cost is that you now cannot explain the equidistance result if you allow different species to have different mutation rates. <br><br>You may find an alternative explanation of your data in my paper,<br>“Inverse relationship between genetic diversity and epigenetic complexity” (http://precedings.nature.com/documents/1751/version/2). <br>

    Competing interests

    None declared

  2. Rate variation does not invalidate the equidistance result that supports the constant mutation rate hypothesis

    Shi Huang, The Burnham Institute

    11 February 2009

    There are data as in your nice paper that support rate variation. Rodents have faster mutation rate than the great apes. But there are also data that support constant or similar mutation rate. Thus, all mammals are equidistant to a simpler outgroup such as birds. The constant mutation rate or molecular clock hypothesis was not invented for no reason. It cannot be casually dismissed without a cost. The cost is that you now cannot explain the equidistance result if you allow different species to have different mutation rates.

    You may find an alternative explanation of your data in my paper, “Inverse relationship between genetic diversity and epigenetic complexity” (http://precedings.nature.com/documents/1751/version/2).

    Competing interests

    None declared

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