Bacterial Genomes and Evolution

 
I recently became aware of the fact that Intelligent Design creationists are promoting a strange idea. They bacteria were very complex when life first formed and their genomes have been degrading over time. Kirk Durston, a graduate student at the university of Guelph, pushed this idea in a course on intelligent design. Durston used a number of scientific references to prove his point. The main one was a paper by Miraa et al (200) from Nancy Moran's lab [Bacteria Genomes Are Degrading].

Ryan Gregory is one of the world's leading experts on genomes and their evolution. He's also a Professor at the University of Guelph. Ryan has published an excellent description of what the Mira et al. (2000) paper shows and what it does not show. You should all read it [Bacterial genomes and evolution].

For Kirk Durston's sake, I hope Ryan Gregory isn't on his Ph.D. oral committee.

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