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Chimpanzee Genome Sequenced

Posted by michael on from the in-laws dept.

dharash writes "Nature reports 'Researchers today released a draft version of the genetic sequence of our closest relative, the chimpanzee Pan troglodytes..The differences between the chimp's genetic code and ours should reveal what makes us human...' Click here for the entire article."

4 of 51 comments (clear)

  1. Great by Molina+the+Bofh · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I am wondering how genetics is evolving. After fully understanding how genes work, the next step will be to simulate what each gene will do. After some time, an advanced computer will be able to grow virtual specimens given a genetic code. Like an advanced VMware..

    As they're virtual, they don't need to really pee, sleep, or eat. . As they're virtual, their number is limited Imagine what you could do with a million of those virtual monkeys, seated in front of virtual typewriters, in an infinite ammount of time.

    --

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    Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
    1. Re:Great by Ashran · · Score: 3, Interesting

      There is one fundamental problem in simulating the whole genome and see what it grows.
      For every atom you simulate you need like 10000 times the atoms to store the information about it.
      This means the physical space alone needed to store a full human in memory would be 10000 times bigger than the human :/

      Lets see if quantum computers can help us here, because right now we can only store ~1 bit per atom, and we'd need atleast a few bits to describe what kind of atom it is and a few more bits to describe their position, states, charges, relation to nearby atoms etc. Superpositions might help us here, giving us more than 1 bit per atom.

      This is just discussing the storage aspect, if that should be realtime you'd need a SHITLOAD of processors working on that.

      --

      Before you email me, remember: "There is no god!"
  2. Re:Funded by Michael Jackson by fireduck · · Score: 3, Interesting

    totally offtopic, but...

    regarding Bubbles: When chimps get older they get aggressive and really can't be handled by people anymore (unless you're Steve Irwin or any other of those nuts on Animal Planet). Jackson gave up Bubbles a while back, and the chimp is currently living at a facility in the north end of the San Fernando Valley, along with Geoffrey the giraffe (of Toys R Us commercial fame).

    I had the quite unique experience of visiting this place last year, seeing where all the famous animal actors live. Bubbles was quite threatening, but the giraffe was loads of fun...

  3. Nature also reported... by jabberjaw · · Score: 2, Interesting

    In the November 27 2003 issue of Nature, the jounral also reported on a UN meeting of the GRASP (Great Apes Survival Project) in Paris. Apprantly, there is the very real possibility of every great ape in the wild becoming extinct in less than 100 years. Faced with this, I think it might be a wise idea to start to work on the orang-utan's seqeunce..