title: Dual nature of the genome: genes for the individual life and genes for the evolutionary progress of the population.
abstract: Biological evolution is here postulated to be driven coordinately by the products of specific evolution genes and by non-genetic elements such as the intrinsic properties of matter and random encounter with environmental factors. Evolution genes are supposed to have their own evolutionary history in which second-order selection was exerted at the population level. The products of evolution genes can act as generators of genetic variations and/or as modulators of the frequency of genetic variation. Three major natural strategies, each with a number of specific mechanisms contribute to the overall spontaneous production of genetic variants. Each of these three strategies contributes its own specific quality to genetic variation. The difficulties of experimentally investigating these strategies and a wider discussion of some of the postulates within the scientific community are outlined. Finally, the general relevance of the postulated duality of the genome for our world view is briefly mentioned.
authors.affiliation: Biozentrum, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland. Werner.Arber@unibas.ch
authors.forename: Werner
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Arber
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D004260:DNA Repair; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D014644:Genetic Variation; D005828:Genetics, Population; D016678:Genome; D006801:Humans; D011995:Recombination, Genetic
chemical_list: D004247:DNA