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PURE NATURE SPECIALS: MUTATIONS: THE SCIENCE OF SURVIVAL

1. A mutation is a change in our genes.

2. Mutations are happening all the time, to all of us, but most of the time theyre
invisible.
3. When the cells in our body divide, they must replicate their DNA. Sometimes thats
when a copy error can take place, but usually its fixed up by our bodys own
correction system.
4. A mutation can occur in any cell in the body, but if it occurs in a cell that gives
rise to an

egg or a sperm and those egg or sperm is used to make a child, then

those mutations could be passed on to future generations.

5. Sometimes a small mutation may be an advantage, giving the animal an edge
over their competitors.
6. Positive mutations arent always a matter of life and death.
7. Ever since life began, mutations have enabled species to adapt to changing
conditions. But mutations are actually random events, and can occur for better or
for worse.
8. If theres a disadvantage to a mutation then it will probably die out. But if theres
an advantage than natural selection will ensure that it will eventually spread
throughout a community. Working together, mutation and natural selection are the
engines of evolution.
9. Extinction meant inability to adapt.
10. But now, a relative newcomer on the scene, homo sapiens, has begun
engineering evolution to suit himself. By selecting mutations and breeding from
them, we humans are changing the world to the way we want it.
11. Different mutagens cause their damage in different ways.
12. Organisms can build up, inside their own genes, a degree of variation which is
never seen in the environment, but under stressful circumstances those mutations
can pop out, appear in the environment, and perhaps be selected by natural
selection.
13. In nature, mutations are slow and random. In the lab, researchers are stepping
in to make them fast and surgically precise.