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Switching Tasks Changes Worker Bee DNA
`puddingebola writes "A report in the journal Nature Neuroscience (paywalled) says scientists have observed epigenetic markers in bees that correspond to their roles in the society. From the article, 'Honeybees are born into their place in society. Those fed royal jelly as larvae emerge as queens and do little but lay eggs. The rest become worker bees and divvy up the jobs that need doing around the hive. While some worker bees remain at home, others take flight in search of nectar, pollen and other hive essentials. The entire honeybee workforce are genetically identical sisters. But analysis of the worker bees' DNA revealed that foragers had one pattern of chemical tags on their genes, while those that stayed home had another. When bees swapped one job for the other, their genetic tags changed accordingly.'"
Totally feel the bees on that.
Whenever I need to completely switch gears from one project to the next (like going from Drupal into Zend Framework), I will require at least two weeks of downtime (although I would never dare admit to it to my manager). It's unavoidable. It's like my brain is jammed between channels and no matter how much I beat the horse, it will be this way while my neurons rearrange themselves. Then, one sunny day, bing it's all realigned and reprogrammed and I'm off to the productive races.
Wish there were medical-creative downtime available....
Tasks are not! transcoded to DNA; this is NOT an exception to the central dogma of molecular biology. The epigenome is RNA and protein and smaller signaling molecules; the DNA sequence itself is untouched, and nothing happens to the deoxy-ribose sugar backbone.
Think of it as the metadata getting changed, not the code - a differing pattern of lines of code being commented out.
This is epigenetic. That is, the genes aren't being altered. What is being altered is the pattern of which genes are on and off--which proteins are being expressed. What's impressive here is that the change is so big and capable of reversals.
Epigenetics is not about the DNA sequence itself, but rather about how the DNA is managed and accessed. Generally it refers to the protein that helps to condense the DNA and make some parts more accessible than others. Really the more noticeable change would be in their RNA, which is the sequence of expressed genes.
Basically if your genome is a tape library, RNA is your local hard drive, which is pulling files as needed from the tape library. Your system RAM is, of course, protein.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Problem with Brave New World, 1984, THX-1138 and other dystopias is that no society like that would ever emerge. People won't allow themselves to be suppressed so readily. Instead you have to TRICK the people into believing their suppression is actually freedom & democracy. For example:
- Convincing people that private profits and shared losses is a good thing. - When the rich corporate managers "win" they get to keep the money for themselves, but when they "lose" then the loss is spread across the entire taxpayer base. (TARP and Stimulus Bills and QE1/2/3 are what I'm talking about.) Many people actually believe making the workers bear the burden of the loss is a good thing!
Somehow I fail to see how my losing ~$15,000 funding Goldman Sachs and Solyndra with free cash is benefiicial for me, but millions of other people think it is. That's a True dystopia. Rob from the poor/middle incomes and give to the rich.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
not to multi-task.
Have you been watching B movies?
A Hive is not identical sisters. There are usually 3 to 5 males who mated with the Queen, so there are factions which are more closely related and they try to elevate their Queen larvae when the time comes to create a new Queen. Also, even the sisters with the same 2 parents are not genetically identical, they still have the usual mix of traits from both parents from when the egg was fertilized.
Worker bees in a hive are not geneticially identical, nor are they all sisters in the usual sense of the word. Queen bees are typically multiply mated during a mating flight and store sperm for life. Male bees develop from unfertilized eggs and they only have one set of chromosomes which each of their offspring inherits in full. Pairs of worker bees therefore either have the same father so they share on average 75% of their genes, or they have different fathers so that they share 25% of their genes.
Awesome metaphor! You're generally spot on - DNA base sequence is untouched / nothing happens to the phosphate backbone / epigenetics is all about controlling which genes are made into proteins - but to be nitpicky, an important epigenetic phenomenon which is probably also operating here is DNA methylation. DNA is directly modified in a way which alters the pattern in which genes are expressed, is fairly long-term for the cell and is heritable by future generations of cells in the organism (i.e. epigenetically).
So the story title is very misleading, but technically correct.
Clearly you were below average, because it's was QUITE obvious what "level" a student was at due to the labeling of the classes: "accelerated or AP" at the top end and "remedial" at the bottom end. Everything else was average. Grammar school is a bit more segregated and harder to get on or off a given track since you tended to have all of your classes with the same group.
And it's not some conspiracy as to why the wealthier kids end up at the top. Well educated people tend to have more money and tend to value education more than those who do not. Educated parents tend to push their children harder than the school does and often have the means to provide outside education. They also complain more and browbeat teachers into placing children higher. It's not class warfare.
Suddenly, common sense broke out on the Internet!
buying a home on credit, or using it as equity to get credit, is an investment, a gamble that its value wont change significantly other than to maybe go up. like other investments, its subject to market changes. you assume that risk willingly by buying the house. really everything is essentially an investment, it's just the degree to which other people also want said item. and some people dont use their homes for credit, and dont intend to sell, content to stay so for them its less of an investment (gamble).
but if its value goes down cause you neglected it, should we fix you then? if its value goes down cause the neighborhood goes to pot, should we fix you then? so why is this any different? you assumed the risk when you bought it. no it probably didnt seem like a big risk. but every so often the long shots come in.
(for the record I didnt support the bailouts either, though they did turn a bit of profit for the taxpayer in the end)
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
You bet on a house. You lost.
The reason it was a bad bet isn't necessarily the government's fault, but they could have done more to keep the bubble from forming and alleviating the problem afterwards.
But no one owes it to you to "make you whole".
The reason that the government stepped in to help the financial market is because it would have taken down the government with it. The reason it made a bet on solar power is because it would enrich everyone.