The phrase "act of mutation" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used in contexts related to biology, genetics, or any field discussing changes or transformations.
Example: "The act of mutation is a natural process that contributes to the evolution of species over time."
Alternatives: "process of mutation" or "instance of mutation".
If this was the case, then the very act of mutating would decrease the future mutation rate.
The reason is that mutation rate is only selected on indirectly, and recombination affects the capacity of indirect selection to act on mutation rate.
That is, the number of mutation targets within a clone may increase by growth and amplification while the mutation rate per act of replication remains unchanged.
On the other hand, some students consider pressure to act on mutations: "Selective pressures are mindless agents of natural selection that operate on mutations that occur by random chance".
‡Effect of mutation: Act, activating; In, inactivating.
Functional constraint need not act simply as a decreased rate of mutation but can also act as a biased substitution pattern.
By decoding the genome of the cancer, and looking at a type of mutation that acts like a "molecular clock", researchers were able to pinpoint its origin to 11,000 years ago.
The IHC method detects this abnormal accumulation and acts as an indirect indicative of mutation in TP53 gene [ 55].
At the population level, natural selection acts on the basic processes of mutation and recombination, causing some events to be quickly purged from the population and others to become widespread [ 2].
That said, Graphical Thinking does not control for the simple act of introducing the topics of mutations, phenotype, and molecular level phenomena to students and we are not claiming that the effects observed following students working with Mendel/Muller are necessarily due to the specific structure of the activity.
