Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Gene expression noise can suggest a role for stochasticity during development. But Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz and Sui Huang argue that care should be taken in data interpretation and language use before labelling developmental events as 'random'.
There has been recent progress in identifying selective sweeps underlying a range of adaptations. Jonathan Pritchard and Anna Di Rienzo argue that many adaptive events in natural populations may occur by polygenic adaptation, which would largely go undetected by conventional methods for detecting selection.