text: Studies have shown that diversity among nonsynonymous substitutions is significantly lower than among synonymous substitutions. This is due to the fact that nonsynonymous substitutions are subject to much higher selective pressures than synonymous mutations. Motoo Kimura (1968) determined that calculated mutation rates were impossibly high, unless most of the mutations that occurred were either neutral or "nearly neutral". He determined that if this were true, genetic drift would be a more powerful factor in molecular evolution than natural selection. The "nearly neutral" theory proposes that molecular evolution acting on nonsynonymous substitutions is driven by mutation, genetic drift, and very weak natural selection, and that it is extremely sensitive to population size. In order to determine whether natural selection is taking place at a certain loci, the McDonald–Kreitman test can be performed. The test consists of comparing ratios of synonymous and nonsynonymous genes between closely related species to the ratio of synonymous to nonsynonymous polymorphisms within species. If the ratios are the same, then Neutral theory of molecular evolution is true for that loci, and evolution is proceeding primarily through genetic drift. If there are more nonsynonymous substitutions between species than within a species, positive natural selection is occurring on beneficial alleles and natural selection is taking place. Nonsynonymous substitutions have been found to be more common in loci involving pathogen resistance, reproductive loci involving sperm competition or egg-sperm interactions, and genes that have replicated and gained new functions, indicating that positive selection is taking place.