American scientists have rebuilt a mouse gene that was present 500 million years ago but later split. They say the experiments shed light on the process of evolution and could be important in developing gene therapy techniques.

“We are first to reconstruct an ancient gene,” said co-researcher Petr Tvrdik of the University of Utah. “We have proven that from two specialised modern genes, we can reconstruct the ancient gene they split off from.

“It illuminates the mechanisms and processes that evolution uses, and tells us more about how Mother Nature engineers life.”

Technorati tag: Evolution, Genetics