Tag: fitness
The Role of Lignin for Fire, Explained
Without lignin, there would be no woody plants, no wood, no coal, no charcoal, no fire, no pottery, and certainly no iron or metallurgy.
In Praise of Copper, a Gift from Nature
If the conductivity of copper were ten times less, wires would have to be ten times the cross-sectional area to provide the same conductivity.
Why Do We Not Spontaneously Combust?
James Lovelock has pointed out that atmospheric levels of oxygen much above about 25 percent, let alone 30 percent, would cause raging conflagrations today.
Collateral Damage: Mutations Decrease Fitness in More Ways than One
If mutations are the raw material for evolution, they are like explosives with unpredictable effects.
Paper Shows that “Mutational Load” Arguments Don’t Refute ENCODE
Perhaps one of ENCODE’s staunchest critics has been Dan Graur, a molecular evolutionary biologist at the University of Houston.