Experiments Challenge Genetic Theory

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Experiments challenge genetic theory

For more than 40 years, microbiologists have held that the only bacteria able to survive environmental upheavals, such as abrupt temperature shifts or food shortages, are those that have changed, or mutated, before encountering the stress. But recent experiments may prompt scientists to revise this view. Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston say they have shown that bacteria can somehow adopt genetic traits in response to a particular environment, then pass on these acquired characteristics to their offspring.

This field has long remained dormant, says one of the researchers, in part because it is so …