Re: Moles, elephants and manatees OH MY!

Arthur V. Chadwick (chadwicka@swac.edu)
Mon, 12 Jan 1998 19:27:28 -0800

At 04:41 PM 1/12/98 -0600, Kevin wrote:
>Hello,
>
>I am writing in regards to an article I read in the October 1997 issue of
Discover magazine entitled, *Island Africa.* It was about how an
evolutionary biologist studied five particular genes in dozens of different
mammals. He compared nucleotide sequences of a number of critters and found
that elephants, manatees, golden moles, elephant shrews and hyraxes and
found that they have more in common than once thought.
>
>My question is, how can just *five particular genes* give enough
information to say that these animals shared a common ancestor? It would
also seem that given the amount of information found in genes that, if you
looked hard and long enough, you could find some similarities between all
mammals. Indeed there has to be similarities.

Remember, in Molecular Taxonomy, the more characteristics you study, the
less certain any particular relationship appears, as a general rule. Thus
it is unremarkable that 5 particular genes showed relationships that were
unexpected (based on perhaps conventional taxonomy, and perhaps a larger
suite of molecular features)
Art
http://chadwicka.swau.edu