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The Mechanism of Variation1

Nature volume 125, pages 992–993 (1930)Cite this article

Abstract

THE fundamental work on the production of variants by means of X-rays and the γ-radiation of radio-active substances, which has been chiefly carried out during the last two or three years in America, is of profound interest to all students of biology. By these means H. J. Muller found it possible to increase 150 times the minute amount of natural variation which is only accessible to estimation by laborious searching through tens of thousands of individuals. It was observed that these variations were completely fortuitous, occurring in any characteristic, in any direction, some quite new, some known as occurring under natural conditions, some losses, some gains, but numerically proportional to the duration of radiation, or to the amount of air-ionisation produced by the radiation used.

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References

  1. Last spring when the work of Goodspeed and Olson called my attention to the causation of variation by X-rays, I suggested (NATURE, June 29, 1929, p. 981) that cosmic radiation is a factor in the production of variation by direct action on the germ-plasm. At the time I did not know that this suggestion had been made and had been experimentally substantiated by the brilliant work of the American investigators whose results are summarised in this communication.— H. H. D.

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Authors
  1. HENRY H. DIXON
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DIXON, H. The Mechanism of Variation1. Nature 125, 992–993 (1930). https://doi.org/10.1038/125992b0

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