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Updated: Mar 13, 2026

Demonstration of the Sequence Alignment to Predict Across Species Susceptibility Tool for Rapid Assessment of Protein Conservation
Published on: February 10, 2023
Does Sequence Conservation Provide Evidence for Biological Function?
Seila Omer1, Timothy J Harlow1, Johann Peter Gogarten2
1Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of Connecticut, 91 North Eagleville Road, Storrs, CT 06269-3125, USA.
Abstract:
Finding a signature of purifying selection in a gene is usually interpreted as evidence for the gene providing a function that is targeted by natural selection. This opinion offers a very different hypothesis: purifying selection may be due to removing harmful mutations from the population, that is, the gene and its encoded protein become harmful after a mutation occurred, possibly because the mutated protein interferes with the translation machinery, or because of toxicity of the misfolded protein. Finding a signature of purifying selection should not automatically be considered proof of the gene's selectable function.
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