Historical changes of the concept of gene structure

A — 1930ies. Chromosomes are “chains of genes”. B — 1960ies. Genes are divided by spacers and heterochromatic sequences. C — Present. Genes have introns removed from pre-mRNA during the process called splicing.

The image has been created for the popular-science review devoted to the role of different molecules studies in biological evolution and in taxonomy studies.

One of the central problems of biology consists in classification of living things and determination of their evolutionary relationship. Approaches used in molecular biology have become available not very long ago but one can hardly imagine various taxonomic studies without using these techniques.

Also, from the point of view of modern Theory of Evolution the crucial moment in the study of the variety of living organisms is not only the possibility to classify them but also the possibility to find out the time of the divergence between species and large taxonomic assemblages. Moreover, modern genomics allows seeking new tools to achieve these goals.