Evolution of biological complexity.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 10781045.
- Also identified by PMC identifier 18257.
- No licence information is recorded for this record.
- Because redistribution is not established, this page shows the abstract only. Follow the links below for the full text.
Abstract
To make a case for or against a trend in the evolution of complexity in biological evolution, complexity needs to be both rigorously defined and measurable. A recent information-theoretic (but intuitively evident) definition identifies genomic complexity with the amount of information a sequence stores about its environment. We investigate the evolution of genomic complexity in populations of digital organisms and monitor in detail the evolutionary transitions that increase complexity. We show that, because natural selection forces genomes to behave as a natural "Maxwell Demon," within a fixed environment, genomic complexity is forced to increase.
Medical subject headings
- Biological Evolution
- Genome
- Information Theory