Can Quantum Theory Concepts Shed Light on Biological Evolution Processes?

Abstract

The Lamarckian theory of biological evolution assumed that changes induced by the environment on what we now call a ‘phenotype’ could be transferred to its ‘genotype’, while the Darwinian theory was based on natural and sexual selection of those ‘genotypes’ that showed up in fit ‘phenotypes’. Darwinian mechanisms have proven rather efficient in explaining microevolution processes, but not sufficient for understanding macroevolution, speciation and radiation, which involve highly coordinated, structural and functional biological changes. The fact that the nucleic acids bearing the genetic material are amenable to quantum theory, as foreseen by Schrodinger, raises the question as to whether the physico-chemical internal dynamics of these biomolecules over extended time scales could not play a crucial role in these coordinated changes. As wave mechanics took its roots in de Broglie’s analysis of the Maupertuis and Fermat extremum integral principles, one may go further and wonder if a similar formulation involving also an extremum integral principle may not be derived for biological evolution as well, which would make its traditional finalist flavour compatible with the modern determinist views. The present paper is a recollection of these ideas aimed at a possible formulation of a quantum theory of biological evolution.