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DNA-rainbow, A New Vision of Human Chromosomes

Posted by samzenpus on from the painting-genes dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Two scientists have rendered amazing pictures using datafiles from the human genome project. They assigned different colors to the DNA and rendered images showing interesting patterns and strange structures of our chromosomes. It might be a groundbreaking new idea for displaying and maybe better understanding our genes. With its fascinating pictures it is a beautiful mix of science and art."

10 of 161 comments (clear)

  1. Magic Eye? by SinVulture · · Score: 5, Funny

    No matter how hard I try, I can't see the sailboat!

  2. I dunno... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I tried banging the side of my computer, but all I see is static. Something must be wrong with the rabbit-ears on my modem.

  3. Your chromosomes... by Riktov · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...are heavily fragmented. This could degrade performance in creating offspring.

    Would you like to optimize your chromosomes?

    [Yes] [No] [Cancel]

  4. Hey, baby. . .. by gardyloo · · Score: 5, Funny

    Taste the rainbow!

  5. Oops by tehSpork · · Score: 5, Funny

    It looks like the DNA has been Slashdotted.

    Hopefully the next version will have developed a natural defense mechanism to handle the strain Slashdot puts on servers. :)

  6. Arrgh! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    My genes! They've been slashdotted!

    I need tissues!

  7. Re:Reminds me of the Bible Code by QuantumG · · Score: 2, Funny

    Great, now I'm gunna be on that site trying to find a Flying Spaghetti Monster.

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
  8. Genetics by worst_name_ever · · Score: 3, Funny

    I don't even see the genes anymore - just blonde, brunette, redhead...

    --

    In Soviet Rush, today's Tom Sawyer gets high on you.
  9. Hmmmm... by flajann · · Score: 2, Funny
    While I find the DNA rainbow interesting, I do have a few criticisms.
    1. I think that speaking of "information" in the DNA is a bit misleading. It is not "information" in the sense we normally think of information. The DNA sequence is the result of millions of years of evolution. One might even say that the DNA sequence is a "phenotype of evolution". It is as much a phenotype of evolution as the organism is a phenotype of the DNA itself.
    2. The relationship between arbitrary base pairs is multidimensional and will not really be elucidated by mapping them on a 2-dimensional grid. It is a curio, but not likely to yield much of anything useful.
    3. I would think it would be much better to do this with codons than with base pairs. Since it is codons that code for amino acids, we might actually see some really cool patterns that way. Some of the codons are polymorphic and that can be taken into account with the color assignments.
    4. I wish the site were a bit more interactive. Basically, I want to be able to dynamically manipulate the data in real-time, in 3 or 4 dimensions, and be able to fly through it. OK, this would call for much more than just a mere website. Perhaps I am trying to inspire someone to crate an OpenGL project that would do this!!!

    Overall, I think this is wicked cool, but amateurish from the standpoint of science. Actually, I'd like to see a Gerald Edelelman approach to handling and analyzing the DNA -- which would be wicked cool! See From Brain Dynamics to Consciousness to see what I mean. Applying his neural darwinistic approaches to DNA would not only reveal many surprises, but would be referentially cool, applying neural evolution to what was the result of biological (and memetic) evolution!

    OK, so you think I am mad as a hatter. Perhaps. Perhaps not.

    --
    Ruby Neural Evolution of Augmenting Topologies
  10. Heroes by kalirion · · Score: 2, Funny

    So, which colors represent superpowers?