First Complete Lizard Genome Sequenced 105
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Unknown Lamer
from the reptiles-are-from-space dept.
from the reptiles-are-from-space dept.
iamrmani writes with an article in the International Business Times about the recent gene sequencing of a lizard. From the article: "Researchers have managed to sequence the genes of the green anole lizard, which is the first non-bird species of reptile to have its genome sequenced and assembled. The findings, which researchers have obtained after assembling and analyzing more than 20 mammalian genomes, may go a long way in understanding the evolution of animals and humans."
Interesting (Score:5, Informative)
Re:birds aren't lizards (Score:5, Informative)
Dinos are reptiles, birds are dinos
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phylogenetics [wikipedia.org]
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/phylogenetics_04 [berkeley.edu]
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/File:Phylogenetic-Groups.svg [wikimedia.org]
However, mammals are not reptiles (but reptiles and mammals are both amniotes)
Re:Interesting (Score:2, Informative)
Modern biology is moving away from the designation "reptiles" because it is paraphyletic, that is, it does not include all of th descendants of one common ancestor. Reptiles excludes birds and mammals. This makes it useless to modern science, which focuses more on the way things are related than the superficial similarities between them as classical linnean taxonomy does. This is known as cladistics. Learn about it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cladistics