Noted: Some scientists have wondered whether such duplications might help explain some of the wild variety of the animal kingdom, said Prashant Sharma, a professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison and also an author of the study. Complex genomes and more varied organisms might seem to go together.
But despite harvestmen’s variety — there are more than 6,000 species in the group — there is no sign of duplication in the harvestman genome, the researchers report. And horseshoe crabs, arachnids that had at least one genome duplication in their evolution, have only a handful of species.
“Arachnids really challenge this idea,” Dr. Sharma said. Having more genes might help organisms diversify, but only if environmental conditions and other factors line up correctly as well, he speculates.