Gorilla Genome Is Bad News for Evolution
Posted on 03/14/2012 6:35:40 AM PDT by fishtank
Gorilla Genome Is Bad News for Evolution
by Jeffrey Tomkins, Ph.D. *
Evolutionists have long maintained that modern primate species (including, in their view, humans) are branches on an evolutionary tree that lead back to a common ancestor. But the recent news of the published genome sequence for the gorilla in the journal Nature adds more solid data to the growing problem facing the current model of primate evolution.1
This problem is related to a biological paradigm called independent lineage sorting. To illustrate this concept among humans and primates, some segments of human DNA seem more related to gorilla DNA than chimpanzee DNA, and vice versa. This well-established fact produces different evolutionary trees for humans with various primates, depending on the DNA sequence being analyzed.
In a significant number of cases, evolutionary trees based on DNA sequences show that humans are more closely related to gorillas or orangutans than chimpanzees—again, all depending on which DNA fragment is used for the analysis. The overall outcome is that no clear path of common ancestry between humans and various primates exists, so no coherent model of primate evolution can be achieved.
The recent release of the gorilla genome spectacularly highlights this evolutionary quandary. According to the Nature study, "in 30% of the genome, gorilla is closer to human or chimpanzee than the latter are to each other."1
Of course, independent lineage sorting and the problems it presents for evolutionists are nothing new. It existed before the days of DNA sequencing in regards to mosaics of morphological traits, and it now exists in light of each new genome sequence discovery.
One of the first papers to expose this problem in the area of primate evolution was published in 2007 by the Center for Integrative Bioinformatics of Vienna's Ingo Ebersberger and his colleagues. They wrote:
Thus, in two-thirds of the cases, a genealogy results in which humans and chimpanzees are not each other's closest genetic relatives. The corresponding genealogies are incongruent with the species tree. In concordance with the experimental evidences, this implies that there is no such thing as a unique evolutionary history of the human genome. Rather, it resembles a patchwork of individual regions following their own genealogy.2
It is noteworthy that both the recent gorilla paper and Ebersberger's report utilize highly filtered data in which repetitive DNA (which comprises a significant portion of the genome) is masked and omitted, homologous (similar) regions are pre-selected, and sequence gaps are omitted. Both papers cited here explicitly state this. After this initial level of data selection, a methodology called multiple sequence alignment lines up the DNA segments between multiple organisms and the data is parsed into evolutionary trees.
Therefore, the data are always carefully prepared and selected for optimal tree development and should be full of evolution-favorable DNA sequences. Nevertheless, despite all of the data manipulation to make it more conducive to an evolutionary outcome, the picture that always emerges is a unique mosaic pattern of DNA between the various genomes being compared.
These results continue to clearly support a Genesis-based biblical view of unique created kinds and mankind being created in the image of God.
References
Scally, A. et al. 2012. Insights into hominid evolution from the gorilla genome sequence. Nature. 483 (7388): 169-175. Ebersberger, I. et al. 2007. Mapping Human Genetic Ancestry. Molecular Biology and Evolution. 24 (10): 2266-2276.
* Dr. Tomkins is Research Associate at the Institute for Creation Research and received his Ph.D. in Genetics from Clemson University.
Article posted on March 9, 2012.
Gorilla Genome Is Bad News for Evolution
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So those appallingly ill-informed, ignorant people in Mississippi who said they didn't believe in evolution may not be so backward & stupid after all? /s
Gorilla genome offers new clues about human evolution
March 13, 2012 12:53 AM
By Kate Kelland
LONDON: Scientists have sequenced the genome of the gorilla, the last great ape to have its genes decoded, and say it gives new insights into differences between the apes and humans – including their ability to produce competitive sperm.
While confirming that our closest relative is the chimpanzee, the research also shows that around 15 percent of the human gene map resembles the gorilla more closely than it does the chimpanzee genome.
Chris Tyler-Smith, who worked with a team of scientists who presented their findings in a telephone briefing, said that while many human genes are similar to the gorilla versions, it is the ones that differ that are often most intriguing. One difference that stuck out was in the genes involved in sperm production, he said.
“Gorillas live in groups with one male and lots of females, so there’s not much opportunity for sperm competition,” he explained. “It was interesting for us to see that some genes involved in sperm formation ... had either become inactive in gorillas or had decreased in copy number.” The study was published in the journal Nature.
Gorillas survive in just a few isolated and endangered populations in the equatorial forests of central Africa. There are two distinct species, one known as the eastern lowland and mountain gorillas, and the other known as western lowland and cross river gorillas.
The team used DNA from a western lowland gorilla, named Kamilah, to assemble a gorilla genome sequence and then compared it with the gene maps of the other great apes.
They also sampled DNA sequences from other gorillas so they could explore genetic differences between gorilla species.
“The gorilla genome is important because it tells us about that crucial time when we were diverging from are closest evolutionary cousins,” said Aylwyn Scally of Britain’s Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, who led the research team.
The human genome project was completed in 2003, while the chimpanzee gene map was published in 2005 and the orangutan genome was completed in 2011.
“Comparisons between these can help us explore the origins of humans when we separated from the great ape species in Africa between 6 and 10 million years ago,” said Richard Durbin, who also worked on the study at the Sanger Institute.
The team searched more than 11,000 genes in human, chimpanzee and gorilla for genetic changes important in evolution. They found as expected that humans and chimpanzees are genetically closest to each other over most of the genome, but they found many places where this is not the case.
In all three species, genes relating to sensory perception, hearing and brain development showed accelerated evolution, the researchers said, particularly in humans and gorillas.
The team found that divergence of gorillas from humans and chimpanzees happened around 10 million years ago, but the split between eastern and western gorillas was much more recent and more gradual. They compared this split to the one between chimpanzees and bonobos, or modern humans and Neanderthals.
A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Daily Star on March 13, 2012, on page 12.
???
we are closest to the chimps and bonobos, not Gorillas.
Unfortunately, it will probably be the current WH occupant rather than the gorillas who will be responsible should a scene like this occur in the near future ..... (and yes, I am following your ‘prepper’ thread with interest!)
After which you dove into the ocean and chased a school of fish?
THAT was funny. Hope you don’t mind but I’m going to steal it and use it the next time I get into a conversation about evolution theory.
A friend watched a homeless woman pushiing her shopping cart on the sidewalk of an overpass, stop, squat and launch a scud from under her dress.
No DNA samples were take
This has got to be a joke. There were dozens of pre homo sapiens primates that evolved and died out.
Your statement’s exactly the sort of rubbish we’d expect to hear from someone descended from a bunch of types of monkeys. /s
my watch must be slow, the post election of conservative anti-evolution/science thread is here already?
This is nothing. It is just the same old same old monkey trial hokum.
bkmk
I think it is possible that closely related species crossed which would introduce genes from different lines, e.g., chimps and gorillas. Or australopithecus and chimps or ad infinitum.
There have been instances where some chimps seem to have some human genetics, sailors most likely. Seriously, there was a imported baby chimp who grew up in Texas that was probably a cross.
Polar bears and grizzlies have mated successfully in zoos with viable, fertile offspring.
and in the wild too
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