Talk:Mutant

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Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 17 August 2020 and 2 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Ivicentelare2020.

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Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Mam13ae.

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Etymology
Shouldn't the etymology section have some history on the origin of the word...? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.103.124.38 (talk) 21:49, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Marvel mutants?
An encylopedia should probably have more about biological mutants than Marvel Comics' mutants. -- The Anome

I agree. The Marvel Universe stuff really should be forked off to a new article.

I will begin doing this tonight, with luck. ClockworkTroll 02:46, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Done: moved the comic book mutant info to Mutant (fictional). ClockworkTroll 03:15, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Name
Whose decision was it to rename the article and make "wildtype" the opening description? I propose reverting the name and making Wildtype a footnote, or at least not the main thrust of the article. --- Noclevername 23:29, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * agreed. Wildtype is only a minor mention in the article.  Also, Wildtype vs. Mutation is a missleading title.  Immedate change recommended. --Eldarone 00:44, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I've moved the page, per the request listed at WP:RM, and the discussion here. I agree that the previous title was unintuitive and misleading.  I've added a dablink in case anybody finds their way here when looking for The Mutants or The Mutants (San Francisco). -GTBacchus(talk) 03:44, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Sport
Can anybody explain to me the wikilinking of the word "Sport"?


 * Agreed, it merely links to the athletic definition of sport, with a link back to mutant. I'm unlinking it. Noclevername 10:20, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Human Mutation
Isn't body hair or an extended tail an atavism, not a full mutation?


 * It's both; In the cases you mentioned, the characteristic gets superceded by another gene which blocks the expression of the original genes. Absence of the blocking gene allows the earlier version to be expressed. (I'm an amateur, if someone with a background in genetics can explain it better it would be appreciated). Noclevername 23:50, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Ordinary Mutants
Isn't every living thing subject to (admittedly mostly imperceivable) mutations and may thus be termed a mutant? If so, could we have it mentioned in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.44.237.208 (talk) 20:08, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Mutant or developmental abnormality
Yesterday I came across some 'double' daisy, and I uploaded onto Commons, calling it a mutant. But reading this article, I'm not so sure about that anymore. Do such strange forms always indicate a developmental abnormality rather than a mutation? Apdency (talk) 10:47, 22 April 2010 (UTC)


 * To my way of thinking (fruitfly genetics background) it would depend if it's heritable or not. I'd call it a mutant (in the genetic sense) if its offspring (either F1 or F2, depending if dominant or recessive) are also doubled. Otherwise, it might just be indicative of a developmental abnormality. -- Flyguy649 talk 18:20, 22 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree with Flyguy. My intuition is that it's more likely to be a developmental abnormality, but crossing this with a regular daisy and intercrossing the offspring would be the way to tell.  It might be a good idea to rename the file to indicate that it's not known for certain that it's a mutant.  Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 10:19, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you. The only thing I can say is that such a form occurs elsewhere too. Some examples: 1, 2, 3, 4, and what about these amazing caterpillar-like creatures: 5, 6, and finally Mr. Sunny Smile 7. Does that make any sense for finding out? Apdency (talk) 19:27, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Cute pictures! Seeing how common this is actually makes me think it's even more likely to be a developmental abnormality, because if it was genetic someone would have made a novelty line of daisies that always grow like that.  Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 07:23, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

I've seen very similar growth forms before in dandelions and in a euphorbia. I asked a lecturer of mine and they informed me it was most likely caused by a small dose of herbicide affecting the plant's development. I notice that you said you took the photograph at a nature reserve though so that seems unlikely. It's not impossible to see how the genes involved in flowering (see ABC model of flower development) could be disrupted so that it gained a linear form as well as being circular. You could of course test if it where genetic by gathering the seeds from the flower and growing them. 131.111.30.21 (talk) 14:46, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 00:40, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Benefits of Mutant species
Hello everyone!

Sorry this is my first time using wikipedia, but I posted another section of this Benefits of Mutant species,and I would love feedback on it.

Thanks!

Benefits of Mutant species
Mutants spawn from an increase in mutations within a given species that allow them to adapt a physiological difference that provides them with either subtle, or important traits, thereby affecting the new species fitness. Within any given environment, a certain species has a variety of different competitors for resources, and predators to be wary of. Darwin emphasized a phenomenon, natural selection, which referenced how only the best suited species in a given environment will out-last, and out-compete their competition

Beneficial mutations can increase the odds that a species will prevail within that environment, allowing it to survive a longer time and increase its fitness. This applies to truly realistic environments, which are ephemeral. They are dynamic and constitute a multitude different aspects especially as seasons change. This means for a species to exist within this ecosystem, they must be able to adapt to whatever environmental cues they are given[4]. This gives rise to some species having special advantages over others. A difference between species is prevalent in this manner. For example, If there are two very closely linked organisms, but one has the ability to survive with less amounts of food (organism A) and an organism who needs a regular amount of nutrients (organism B), and if there was an environmental shift in their ecosystem that caused their prey to leave, then organism A could have a higher rate of survival than compared to organism B. This is an example of a beneficial mutation that caused a mutant who can live within their harsh environment[5]. This success will cause organism A to have a higher fitness rate, thereby rapidly expanding the mutations which helped organism A to survive, to other future generations. This creates a whole new mutant of the original species[2] [3].

Another example of this is during the [| industrial revolution]. During this massive increase in factories and other facilities, there was an influx in air pollution within many different environments. This influx caused a massive change in many ecosystems. The peppered-moth, shown here, had a body color of white, which aided it in blending well within its environment to avoid predators. Unfortunately because of the influx of air pollution, the trees it would hide in started turning darker and darker because of the black smock coming from the factories. A mutant species spawned of the peppered-moth, bearing a black-skin phenotype [|phenotype] that allowed the new moths to hide in the darker environment better than the white moths could. This allowed for a higher survival rate of the black-skin moths, and a dwindling of the white-skin moths.

One sided?
Hello everyone

I feel that this page is one-sided because it focuses so heavily on the positives of being a mutant species. I believe that more information should be included about some of the positive traits which are lost through mutation, despite the fact that the organism's total fitness may increase regardless.

JJCim (talk) 22:54, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Contradictory/nonsensical theoretical definition of "mutation"
According to the article, emphasis mine, "in biology, and especially in genetics, a mutant is an organism or a new genetic character arising or resulting from an instance of mutation, which is generally an alteration of the DNA sequence of the genome or chromosome of an organism. [...] It is a characteristic that would not be observed naturally in a specimen. The natural occurrence of genetic mutations is integral to the process of evolution."

So, on the one hand, mutations occur naturally, but somehow they are not naturally observed in an organism? If we suppose that the "not natural" is correct, and the the "natural occurence" is incorrect, then what are we left with? What else could it be? Artificial? Supernatural? The contradiction obviously has to be resolved in favor of "natural".

The article further specifies "mutation": "Mutants arise by mutations occurring in pre-existing genomes as a result of errors of DNA replication or errors of DNA repair. [...] A mutation [...] is a change in the sequence of standard base pairs. Errors of repair occur when repair  processes inaccurately replace a damaged DNA sequence."

It's at this point not clear whether there are mutations that do NOT occur "as a result of errors of DNA replication [...] or repair," but as the result of something else, and the statement (in p.1) that mutation is "an alteration of the DNA sequence of the genome or chromosome" seems to indicate that any change to the genome is an instance of mutation, and not all changes to the genome are due to errors: genetic engineering changes the genome too. This, taken together with the article saying outright that mutation is "not observed naturally" (and thus would be artificial, if not supernatural), seems like it identifies "mutation" as a possible or even obligate result of artifical tampering.

All in all, the article appears to have a schizophrenic undercurrent of trying to say that GMOs (being the product of artificial "alteration of the DNA sequence") are mutants. Now, this may or may not be correct, but as the article is written now, this striving leads to comprehensibility issues. Can a biologist adjucate on this one way or another, and clean it up? --Don Ecchi (talk) 06:37, 10 March 2023 (UTC)