Human Genome More Like a Functional Network

bshell writes "An article in science blog says we may have to rethink how genes work. So called "junk DNA" actually appears to be functional. What's more it works in a mysterious way involving multiple overlaps that seems to be connected in some sort of network." From the article: "The ENCODE consortium's major findings include the discovery that the majority of DNA in the human genome is transcribed into functional molecules, called RNA, and that these transcripts extensively overlap one another. This broad pattern of transcription challenges the long-standing view that the human genome consists of a relatively small set of discrete genes, along with a vast amount of so-called junk DNA that is not biologically active. The new data indicates the genome contains very little unused sequences and, in fact, is a complex, interwoven network. In this network, genes are just one of many types of DNA sequences that have a functional impact. "Our perspective of transcription and genes may have to evolve," the researchers state in their Nature paper, noting the network model of the genome "poses some interesting mechanistic questions" that have yet to be answered."

Comments

Nature, the Idiot.

[Sqreater]

Nature is NOT an idiot. Of course she doesn't carry massive amounts of "junk DNA" along on every cell devision. Apparently ego-fueled "scientists" who see nature as an idiot who has to be corrected have come around a little. Now, if we can just get them to respect nature and the evolutionary process enough not to cross every moral line there is before they find out that stem cells are not a panacea for all man's ills. Nature did NOT overlook stem cells as a repair mechanism. It is for egocentric scientists to explore WHY she doesn't use them to repair things like Parkinson's disease before they go off promising things they will never deliver. A little respect for the complex process of evolution equals common sense in science. And it will save the taxpayer billions of dollars in bogus research funding.