'Orphan' Genes Play An Important Role In Evolution

Every group of animals possesses a small proportion of genes which are extremely variable among closely related species or even unique. Such genes are referred to as "novel," "orphan" or "taxonomically restricted." Their function and origin are often obscure. What are these genes needed for? A new paper, published in this week's issue of the online open access journal, PLoS Biology, explores this question in the freshwater polyp Hydra, which belongs to the same branch of the evolutionary tree as jelly fish.

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