Gene Duplication-Driven Evolution
Charles Darwin‘s first reference to a “gene” appears in the 4th edition of The Origin of Species in 1866. Since then, the gene has emerged as the essential molecular mechanism driving Darwin’s theory. This intersection of natural selection with Gregor Mendel‘s theory of genetic inheritance was later named Modern Evolutionary Synthesis or The Modern Synthesis, largely based on Julian Huxley‘s 1942 book entitled Evolution. The Modern Synthesis.
A gene mutation-driven evolution theory gained increasing popularity. By the 1960s, using emerging gene testing technologies, however, the model began encountering challenges. In the search for a new theory, Susumu Ohno, a geneticist at the City of Hope Medical Center, proposed the gene duplication-driven evolution theory in his book Evolution by Gene Duplication (1970). Since then, researchers have investigated Ohno’s model searching to answer the elusive “what drives evolution” question.