Darwinism and the molecular revolution

Abstract

The main characteristics of Darwin's life and work will be examined, as well as the developments which occurred after his death, especially neodarwinism and the synthetic theory of organic change. In which ways the extraordinary progress made in the field of genetics and molecular biology in the last decades affected our ideas about evolution? This question will be considered using information recently obtained concerning the human genome, and the research performed by our group in a very interesting autosome segment of this genome, the Low Density Lipoprotein Receptor, especially its untranslated 3' region. The conclusion is that Darwin's ideas have been considerably enriched by this new knowledge, but that his basic concepts remain unchanged.