Iris collina resurrection

Nhu Nguyen xerantheum@gmail.com
Wed, 30 Jan 2013 09:39:05 PST
On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 2:10 PM, Leo A. Martin <leo@possi.org> wrote:

> DNA sequencer goggles are not (currently?) good enough to detect variants
> and
> subspecies, so many people whose DNA goggles are stuck on their heads
> [hope/ suspect /
> assume / believe / think / behave as though / wonder whether] variants and
> subspecies do
> not actually exist.
>

Not true, Leo. We have the technology to sequence full genome to study all
the variants of all genes in any given organism, and thus emerged the
latest and hottest field of population genomics (a modern version of the
old population genetics). Whereas in the past we have looked a few genes to
determine population, we now look at ALL of the genes to determine
populations. We are doing this in my lab. A post-doc in lead of a
population genomics project for a species of mushroom found 500,000
locations in the genome that determines population. This power is immense
compare to the several hundred loci used by population geneticists of old.

And of course we know that variants and populations exist. Just take a look
at two seedlings and you can see right away. Taxonomists don't go out of
their way to describe them all because that's not within their field and
even outside of their interest. We just pick one level and study what we
know and allow someone else with an expertise and interest to study deeper
levels.

Nhu



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