Abstract
To understand the way the Genetic Code and the physical–chemical properties of coded amino acids affect accepted amino acid substitutions in short-term protein evolution, taking into account only overall amino acid conservation, we consider an underlying codon-level model. This model employs codon pair-substitution frequencies from an empirical matrix in the literature, modified for single-base mutations only. Ordering the degenerated codons according to their codon information value (Volkenstein, 1979), we found that three-fold and most of four-fold degenerated codons, which have low codon values, were best fitted to rank-frequency distributions with constant failure rate (exponentials). In contrast, almost all two-fold degenerated codons, which have high codon values, were best fitted to rank-frequency distributions with variable failure rate (inverse power-laws). Six-fold degenerated codons are considered to be doubly assigned. The exceptional behavior of some codons, including non-degenerate codons, is discussed.
Published Version
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