Difference between revisions of "Talk:Point mutation"

Revision as of 05:38, February 14, 2009

Genetic Information

Philip, I have to ask about this addition, point mutations do not add information to the genome. Whereas they do not change the genome size they can change what is actually produced. For example, the sentence "I love my cat" vs. "I love my hat". Both are of the same size however the information is different. While this was a simple explanation it does apply to genomic expression. Many proteins are duplicated on the genome, this actually allows for gene regulation. Based on the promoters and regulatory proteins it is possible to have a point mutation in one of the duplicated sequences that changes the function of the protein expressed, thereby increasing the information (original protein and mutant now expressed) but not changing genomic size. Unless you are equating genomic size with information. It might help if I write about gene regulation sometime, most are not exposed to it in college since it is a very specific topic.--Able806 09:33, 4 February 2009 (EST)

Rather a late response, and pointless, given the merge, but I was primarily correcting the wording to what the reference was actually claiming. Philip J. Rayment 09:41, 11 February 2009 (EST)

Thank you, I had guessed that after reading through the reference a bit. Something I have to ask, the papers published by the ICR and such groups, are they available for scientific review? I would like to research their position about genetic information particularly in relation to increase of information. From what I know of molecular genetics and information molecules, the ability for information to be increased through mutation is possible and has been observed. I would like to research the claims of ICR and such as to why they believe these examples fail. If you could be of assistance with this I would greatly appreciate it.--Able806 10:33, 11 February 2009 (EST)

Almost all such papers are available for anybody (scientists or otherwise) to "review" (read and comment on), as they have been published. But is that what you are asking? Are you asking about peer review? Papers published in the Journal of Creation and the CRS Quarterly are peer-reviewed. I don't know about ICR papers, but I suspect that ones published in Impact would be also.

This page list a number of layman's articles and technical papers which cover the information aspect in more detail. Also, Werner Gitt's In the Beginning was Information is available online.

Philip J. Rayment 21:08, 11 February 2009 (EST)

Thank you, Philip. This does help. I am looking for tech papers due to the description of the method used to gather the data. I understand their position; I am trying to understand why they believe it to be impossible. A quick example

The old dog ran.

The old doe ran.

The first example provides the relative age of the animal, the animal, and the action. The second example provides the relative age of the animal, the animal, the action, and the gender of the animal. No increase in letters and only one letter switched however more information is provided. Now I know this is an overly simplified example but it is possible with codons. I will give an example of a sequence as soon as I find my codons to AA matrix.--Able806 09:19, 13 February 2009 (EST)

in my experience people struggle with the concept of a substitution mutation increasing information. Duplication is much easier to understand. Try this. If you're still not getting through, you need to make sure the subject has an appropriate understanding of the definitions of information and new information. Alexkm 09:59, 13 February 2009 (EST)

See the start of the last page (p.31) of this article. Philip J. Rayment 00:38, 14 February 2009 (EST)

I have no problem with understanding the idea of information addition, what I am trying to understand is why those who have problems with the idea of mutation leading to new information have issue with it. I want to know what experiments and calculations they have done to infer this. Just saying it does not make it so.--Able806 15:18, 13 February 2009 (EST)

I'll give an expanded answer on this below. Philip J. Rayment 00:38, 14 February 2009 (EST)

A good, information-increasing point mutation that comes to mind is the LRP5 substitution, which "[enhances] skeletal mass without causing complications of osteopetrosis". Some users may be confused by the term "High-Bone-Mass Disease". If so, please see the medical definition of disease. Some people are unwilling to open their minds to this being an instance of increased information. If that is the case, please proffer a definition of information in this context. MattL 10:48, 11 February 2009 (EST)

Most claims of information-increasing mutations turn out to nothing of the sort, and the linked extract of this paper does not have enough information to say one way or the other in this case. However, a mutation that merely changes the quantity of something (mass in this case) is likely not an information-increasing mutation, just like a cake recipe that has a "mutation" in the quantity of flour is not adding new information. Philip J. Rayment 21:08, 11 February 2009 (EST)

I would disagree; most gene regulation is done by concentrations of protein. Therefore changing the amounts would change the expression. A prime example would be the insulin receptor. This transmembrane protein is activated by insulin and causes several things to occur within the cell, however the concentration of insulin determines the order of events therefore, change the concentration gets a different result. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Able806 (talk)

How different? Anything actually new? Philip J. Rayment 00:38, 14 February 2009 (EST)

Can you write some simple introductory material about the genome, genome expression, regulatory proteins, gene regulation, and mutation? Nearly all of our readers need to know about the basics before they can learn about advanced topics such as point mutation. --Ed Poor ^Talk 09:39, 4 February 2009 (EST)

Sure, let me check out what we have already and work with that, many of these topics do overlap.--Able806 09:57, 4 February 2009 (EST)

After looking atMutation I believe this article should be merged with it. There is a section for Substitution mutations where point mutations would fall. Ed, can I move the text over to the mutation article and you can delete this page?--Able806 10:06, 4 February 2009 (EST)

How about you move the text over and then reduce this page to a redirect. Do you know how to do that? --Ed Poor ^Talk 10:09, 4 February 2009 (EST)

Sure.--Able806 10:10, 4 February 2009 (EST)

I already added to mutation.--Able806 10:15, 4 February 2009 (EST)

Thanks, I see it now. --Ed Poor ^Talk 10:30, 4 February 2009 (EST)