Descendants Can Overcome Parental Mutations

Bad genes from both parents may not spell doom in all cases.  Scientists at Purdue University found that if two parents have bad mutations, the child can sometimes reconstruct the correct gene from the grandparents.  “Our genetic training tells us that’s just not possible,” said Bob Pruitt, co-researcher on the team that ran the experiment repeatedly with the lab plant Arabidopsis.  “This challenges everything we believe.”
    Some unknown mechanism, perhaps using RNA, is storing a template of the correct sequence that the offspring can use to reconstruct the gene, they suspect.  This supplements ordinary Mendelian inheritance with a means of correcting errors.²  About 10% of their experimental offspring were able to inherit the correct gene from the grandparents.  Their work was published in Nature last week.¹  See also News@Nature that says this report “flabbergasts” scientists and “overturns textbook genetics.”  The summary on Science Now describes this as “an inheritable cache of RNA that can reverse evolution, undoing mutations and restoring a gene to its former glory” (emphasis added).  One of the researchers said this experiment “suggests the existence of a unique genetic memory system that can be invoked at will” to reverse harmful mutations.  It would seem that the memory would require procedures for comparing the bad gene with the template, excising the bad gene, and inserting the correct one.  Whatever this mechanism is, it has been “under the radar,” says New Scientist, and could exist in animals and even in humans.

¹Lolle et al., “Genome-wide non-mendelian inheritance of extra-genomic information in Arabidopsis,” Nature 434, 505 – 509 (24 March 2005); doi:10.1038/nature03380.
²Mendel had it mostly right (see online biography); this new mechanism adds to our knowledge of inheritance. 

Trouble in the Darwin Party camp.  They were counting on those lucky mutations producing all the glory, not mechanisms to undo mutations to restore a gene to its former glory.  This is stasis with a vengeance.  We already knew that many genetic errors are corrected in the nucleus or the cell before reproduction occurs; now, another mechanism has come to light that corrects errors after they have left the station, almost like warranty repair service.
    So tell us please, Darwinians: what lucky mutation led to a system that can correct mutations?  Neo-Darwinism won’t get far if its main source of variation – mutations – is kept in check with genetic homeland security.  “Reverse evolution” is not evolution at all; it’s creation.  It implies there was a creation that was so elegant, it contained even a repair warranty: a mechanism to identify when something has gone wrong, and automatically deploy resources to fix it so that the organism could restore its “former glory.”