Over at PhysOrg.com, a new summary discusses a paper on the newly published finding that different protein subunits of RNA polymerases exist side-by-side within the Arabidopsis thaliana’s genes, and that dependent on which protein sub-unit is used, the morphology of the organism changes.
Here’s a quote:
When you remove both proteins, the plants die as embryos; but if they lack just one of the proteins, they still survive, which is evidence that the two alternative forms of the protein are redundant for survival, . . . But despite this, plants missing either 9a or 9b have different physical characteristics, such as leaf shape, suggesting that Pol II built using 9a does not function exactly the same as Pol II assembled using 9b.”
Here is instant “speciation”. Except that gene frequencies haven’t changed in the slightest. It would appear that Nature stores many phenotypic expressions within its genes at all times. I have, for years, been an advocate of the idea of environmental stimulation/activation of different phenotypic expressions. This certainly points us in that direction.