Abstract
Convergent evolution is a potent indicator of optimal design. We show here that convergent evolution occurs in genetic networks. Specifically, we show that multiple types of transcriptional regulation circuitry in Escherichia coli and the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae have evolved independently and not by duplication of one or a few ancestral circuits.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Relevant articles
Open Access articles citing this article.
-
Aligning functional network constraint to evolutionary outcomes
BMC Evolutionary Biology Open Access 24 May 2020
-
NemoProfile as an efficient approach to network motif analysis with instance collection
BMC Bioinformatics Open Access 16 October 2017
-
Binding of cellulose binding modules reveal differences between cellulose substrates
Scientific Reports Open Access 17 October 2016
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 print issues and online access
$209.00 per year
only $17.42 per issue
Rent or buy this article
Prices vary by article type
from$1.95
to$39.95
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

References
Futuyma, D.J. Evolutionary Biology 3rd edn. (Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, Massachusetts, 1998).
Stewart, C.-B., Schilling, J.W. & Wilson, A.C. Nature 330, 401–404 (1987).
Kornegay, J.R., Schilling, J.W. & Wilson, A.C. Mol. Biol. Evol. 11, 921–928 (1994).
Chen, L., DeVries, A.L. & Cheng, C.-H.C. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 94, 3817–3822 (1997).
Lee, T.I. et al. Science 298, 799–804 (2002).
Milo, R. et al. Science 298, 824–827 (2002).
Shen-Orr, S.S., Milo, R., Mangan, S. & Alon, U. Nat. Genet. 31, 64–68 (2002).
Lynch, M. & Conery, J.S. Science 290, 1151–1155 (2000).
Altschul, S.F. et al. Nucleic Acids Res. 25, 3389–3402 (1997).
Wagner, A. Mol. Biol. Evol. 18, 1283–1292 (2001).
Dermitzakis, E.T. & Clark, A.G. Mol. Biol. Evol. 19, 1114–1121 (2002).
Wagner, A. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 97, 6579–6584 (2000).
Stone, J.R. & Wray, G.A. Mol. Biol. Evol. 18, 1764–1770 (2001).
Ferea, T.L., Botstein, D., Brown, P.O. & Rosenzweig, R.F. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 96, 9721–9726 (1999).
Gould, S.J. Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History (W.W. Norton, New York, 1989).
Acknowledgements
G.C.C. is supported by the US Department of Energy's Computational Sciences Graduate Fellowship program, administered by the Krell Institute. A.W. would like to thank the US National Institutes of Health and the Santa Fe Institute for their support.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing financial interests.
Supplementary information
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Conant, G., Wagner, A. Convergent evolution of gene circuits. Nat Genet 34, 264–266 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/ng1181
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ng1181
This article is cited by
-
Aligning functional network constraint to evolutionary outcomes
BMC Evolutionary Biology (2020)
-
NemoProfile as an efficient approach to network motif analysis with instance collection
BMC Bioinformatics (2017)
-
Binding of cellulose binding modules reveal differences between cellulose substrates
Scientific Reports (2016)
-
Tetramer formation in Arabidopsis MADS domain proteins: analysis of a protein-protein interaction network
BMC Systems Biology (2014)
-
A Philosophical Evaluation of Adaptationism as a Heuristic Strategy
Acta Biotheoretica (2014)