Evolutionary changes in protein composition - evidence for an optimal strategy

R. Coutelle*, G. L. Hofacker, R. D. Levine

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Scopus citations

Abstract

The information contained in the composition of different proteins of the same family is analyzed. It is found that within each family the gain in information per amino acid replacement is constant. This finding is interpreted to imply that evolutionary changes in proteins follow an "optimal" path in the sense that they maximize the number of potentially functional sequences that can be generated by T accepted point mutations from a given protein, subject to restrictions due to biological function.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)57-72
Number of pages16
JournalJournal of Molecular Evolution
Volume13
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 1979

Keywords

  • Information gain by accepted point mutations
  • Protein compositions
  • Protein evolution

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