MadSci Network: Molecular Biology
Query:

Re: In directed evolution, how are sequences of interest identified?

Date: Fri Mar 14 15:43:52 2008
Posted By: John J Peloquin, Fellow
Area of science: Molecular Biology
ID: 1205466834.Mb
Message:

Hi Amy,

Often the whole molecule is mutated- doing it this way gives the molecule
more degrees of freedom to vary during the evolutionary process and thus a
bigger universe of solutions to explore. If there is a sequence within the
molecule that needs to be evolved (sorry about the clumsy wording) but the
rest of the molecule needs to remain constant, then the evolutionary
process would be restricted to the region of interest. For example, the
adaptive immune system does some of the latter. The majority of the
immunoglobulin molecule remains constant and can thus continue to interact
normally with Fc receptors, complement etc. whereas the variable regions
involved in binding the target of the antibody can vary and the "improved"
versions are selected by the immune system. In the immune system, generally
this evolution is directed towards increasing specificity and avidity of
binding of the antibody to the target. 

So, to make a long answer short, both approaches are used, and the
situation where a part of the molecule only is evolved depends on the
application. Usually a fair bit is known about the molecule that is to be
altered by evolution when an approach using just a part of that molecule is
used. 


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