nFGFR1, A Protein That Regulates the Regulators

Nobody Predicted It

Most people have heard of genes, but few understand how they work. The textbooks say that the human genome has almost 30,000 genes and that a gene typically is used to create a protein molecule. But in fact it is difficult to speak of a gene as a thing. For example, proteins are usually not simply constructed from a given stretch of DNA that we would call a gene. Instead, proteins are constructed from several different stretches of DNA. In other words, our “genes” are often a collection of smaller segments that are separated in our DNA. These different DNA segments, which are given the uninteresting name of exons for “expressed regions,” are first copied, and then the copies are combined or appended to each other, into one single transcript. The job of combining exons is done by massive protein machines, and a great variety of different combinations are used, depending on what is needed at the moment. To summarize, a gene is often a collection of separate, smaller, DNA regions that can be combined in many different ways to produce different protein molecules. So those roughly 30,000 genes can produce a great many more different proteins.

But there is an entirely separate reason why our genome can construct a huge number of proteins from a relatively small number of so-called genes—each gene can code for multiple proteins. This is because once the exons are combined, the resulting transcript can be read in six different ways. For example, imagine reading a paragraph backwards and finding a different message. This is exactly what happens with some genes—they carry overlapping genetic messages which code for different proteins. Furthermore, a given protein often has different functions. Such protein multifunctionality, as one research explained, “is more the rule than the exception.”

This brief summary of how genes are used, leaving out a great many details, raises a difficulty for the theory of evolution. Namely, there is no scientific evidence that any of this could have evolved. For instance, a typical transcript may contain 1,000 nucleotides or chemical “letters.” There are four different nucleotides, so the number of possible messages is 4 raised to the power of 1,000. That is an astronomical number of possible genetic transcripts, most of which would not produce a functional protein. Today’s science tells us that evolution could not evolve a single protein.

But that is only the beginning. As the summary above indicates, somehow the genes were separated into exons, somehow the machinery for combining, and mixing and matching the exons must have arisen, somehow the machinery for translating the transcript into a protein via the DNA code must have arisen, and so forth.

There is no scientific evidence that evolution could have constructed this.

And there are many more problems with the theory of evolution. For example, consider the circularity that is required in the summary above. Recall that the exons are combined by a massive protein machine. So in other words, a massive protein machine is required to construct proteins. The protein machine must have been constructed first, in order for proteins to be constructed.

The same circularity applies to the translating of the transcript into a protein via the DNA code. In that translation process, a great many proteins are required. Proteins are required to construct proteins. There is no scientific evidence that evolution can construct a circular process such as this.

Furthermore, of all those roughly 30,000 genes, the cell needs to know which ones to express at any given time. For this, there are special DNA binding sites, nearby the genes, to which special proteins attach, in order to regulate gene expression. They help to control which genes are expressed.  Here we have more circularity. Proteins are needed to regulate the process of regulating the construction of proteins.

Those not familiar with these gene regulation proteins do not appreciate how devastating they are for the theory of evolution. Somehow these proteins must have evolved by random genetic mutations. Several exons would need to be combine, leading to the construction of these regulatory proteins. The genetic sequences of nucleotides, in those exons, would have to code for a very special type of protein whose three-dimensional shape and chemistry would enable it to bind to DNA.

Then, separately, the DNA binding sites would have to arise, again from random mutations, where those gene regulation proteins would attach. Those DNA binding sites would need the correct sequence of nucleotides, and would need to be in precisely the correct location in the genome.

And of course the regulatory proteins would need to attach to the DNA binding sites at the correct time, working with yet other gene regulation proteins to control the transcription of a region of DNA. And of course that region of DNA would need to contain the correct genetic sequences, leading to the correct gene product, such as a protein.

There simply is no scientific evidence that this could have evolved.

This week new research out of SUNY Buffalo continues to make this story even more devastating for evolution. The research involves a gene, containing 24 exons, that codes for a special protein known as the nuclear Fibroblast Growth Factor Receptor-1, or nFGFR1.

The nFGFR1 protein plays an important gene regulation role during embryonic development. In this role, nFGFR1 does not regulate the production of proteins that do something in the cell, such as synthesizing a chemical or metabolizing food. Instead, nFGFR1 regulates the regulatory proteins.

In other words, the nFGFR1 protein represents a higher level of gene regulation. The expression of genes is influenced by regulatory proteins, and the expression of the regulatory proteins is influenced by yet other proteins, such as nFGFR1. This is yet another unequivocal refutation of evolutionary theory.

Here is how the lead researcher explained the results:

We’ve known that the human body has almost 30,000 genes that must be controlled by thousands of transcription factors that bind to those genes, yet we didn’t understand how the activities of genes were coordinated so that they properly develop into an organism.

Now we think we have discovered what may be the most important player, which organizes this cacophony of genes into a symphony of biological development with logical pathways and circuits.

We found that this protein works as a kind of ‘orchestration factor,’ preferably targeting certain gene promoters and enhancers. The idea that a single protein could bind thousands of genes and then organize them into a hierarchy, that was unknown. Nobody predicted it.

Evolution is a nineteenth century theory that came out of seventeenth and eighteenth century concerns about divine action, the problem of evil, miracles and a host of related theological doctrines. Darwin’s book was loaded with metaphysical pronouncements about how the Creator would never have intended for this world. These beliefs were handed down to Darwin, and they have persisted in the form of evolutionary thought ever since. Evolution was not motivated by empirical science originally, and with the march of scientific progress, evolutionary thought becomes increasingly silly.