You bet?

Here is the Wikipedia article on the subject, and here is a quote that shows that it wasn't new genetic data but simply a gene duplication:

"In 2012, a team of researchers working under Lenski reported the results of a genomic analysis of the Cit+ trait that shed light on the genetic basis and evolutionary history of the trait.[5] The researchers had sequenced the entire genomes of twenty-nine clones isolated from various time points in the Ara-3 population's history. They used these sequences to reconstruct the phylogenetic history of the population, which showed that the population had diversified into three clades by 20,000 generations. The Cit+ variants had evolved in one of these, which they called Clade 3. Clones that had been found to be potentiated in earlier research were distributed among all three clades, but were over-represented in Clade 3. This led the researchers to conclude that there had been at least two potentiating mutations involved in Cit+ evolution. The researchers also found that all Cit+ clones sequenced had in their genomes a duplication mutation of 2933 base pairs that involved the gene for the citrate transporter protein used in anaerobic growth on citrate, citT. The duplication is tandem, resulting in two copies that are head-to-tail with respect to each other. This duplication immediately conferred the Cit+ trait by creating a new regulatory module in which the normally silent citT gene is placed under the control of a promoter for an adjacent gene called rnk. The new promoter activates expression of the citrate transporter when oxygen is present, and thereby enabling aerobic growth on citrate. Movement of this new regulatory module (called the rnk-citT module) into the genome of a potentiated Cit- clone was shown to be sufficient to produce a Cit+ phenotype. However, the initial Cit+ phenotype conferred by the duplication was very weak, and only granted a ~1% fitness benefit. The researchers found that the number of copies of the rnk-citT module had to be increased to strengthen the Cit+ trait sufficiently to permit the bacteria to grow well on the citrate, and that further mutations after the Cit+ bacteria became dominant in the population continued to accumulate that refined and improved growth on citrate. The researchers conclude that the evolution of the Cit+ trait suggests that new traits evolve through three stages: potentiation, in which mutations accumulate over a lineage's history that make a trait accessible; actualization, in which one or more mutations render a new trait manifest; and refinement, in which the trait is improved by further mutations."


In other words an already existing process was duplicated which allowed the bacteria to better process citrate while in an oxidated environment.

Unfortunately no one has as yet shown in the lab that this has happened. You are talking about imagining unverified speculation based on what you know. Its important to note that you can extrapolate incorrectly just as well as you can correctly.

You and others don't seem to grasp what I'm saying. Not only does it require hundreds of mutations, they have to be specific mutations and if they aren't they end up making the protein harmful to the organism. Scientists have admitted that they can't find a path of one protein evolving into another because during that path the mutations would kill the organism or render it unsuitable for its environment.

Your second sentence is pure nonsense and isn't what I was saying. Straw Man.

You should write a book.

don't encourage him

I bow to your superior semantic skills and cede that I didn't explain it as well as I should have.

Again your semantics are superior to mine. The loss of the 'function' of the protein did happen though.

Actually, they don't and if you have any questions on specific articles or studies I'd be glad to run down the scientific proof that they aren't what they appear.

I'm not talking about your data. The misleading or false data of the scientists and article writers that people are quoting.

Wait, so you linked an article that you can't even read as evidence of your position? I'm about done with you.

No, in other words, mutations accumulate over generations, eventually becoming expressed, and are then refined over generations by further mutations.

Read your own quotes. A mutation is a change. From wiki:

"In genetics, a mutation is a change of the nucleotide sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal genetic element. Mutations result from unrepaired damage to DNA or to RNA genomes (typically caused by radiation or chemical mutagens), errors in the process of replication, or from the insertion or deletion of segments of DNA by mobile genetic elements.[1][2][3] Mutations may or may not produce discernible changes in the observable characteristics (phenotype) of an organism. Mutations play a part in both normal and abnormal biological processes including: evolution, cancer, and the development of the immune system."

It absolutely has been shown in the lab happening. I and others and even you yourself have cited multiple verified sources of this. How can you not see this?

You're describing the complex process of how it happens in detail and using that as evidence that it doesn't happen! And what scientists have admitted this?

No, my sentence is not nonsense. When I said "So by your logic, everything that is a chimp already existed as a recessive gene in the first amoebas." I was being serious. Am I wrong in saying that this is your stance? If this isn't your stance, then please explain precisely what it is.

The production of new genes and traits to aid survival

I'll consider this topic closed.

Quote failure. So some editing is required.



No, someone else linked an article and I couldn't read it because it came up as 'forbidden'. So I cannot refute their arguments because I cannot read the article.