Slashdot Mirror
World-First Working Eukaryotic Cell Made From Plastic
Zothecula writes "Previously, chemists have managed to create artificial cell walls and developed synthetic DNA to produce self-replicating, synthetic bacterial cells. Now, for the first time, researchers have used polymers to produce an artificial eukaryotic cell capable of undertaking multiple chemical reactions through working organelles."
What scientist could resist? I picture one in the lab, cackling wildly, "It's alive. IT'S ALIVE!"
"...chemists have managed to create artificial cell walls and developed synthetic DNA to produce self-replicating, synthetic bacterial cells."
Synthetic prokaryotic organisms (bacteria) containing synthetic DNA? Thought that was a eukaryotic trait.
I am dressed in organic materials: membranes out wool, nylon, cotton that protect me from outside agressions. I have organelles that are clearly distinct from eachother: liver, spleen, heart, brains. I convert various sugars into chemical energy. And I have a function within the greater collection of my peers which we call a "society", instead of a "body". And hell yes, I produce waste: code.
Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
Without their creation being able to replicate, it is essentially not a cell. All they've done now is having made a compartmentalized catalyst.
I hope not, given that it's written at a 6th grade level and it's only two sentences. But hey, if you're a 5th grader that's probably pretty good!
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Again, the press release is misleading. Worse, it fires back on the real and great accomplishment by suggesting it is something that it is not.
The scientists managed to squeeze key enzymes into different minuscule compartments of a cell-like structure. That in itself is fascinating and a great achievement; but that doesn't make an eukaryotic cell. It does not replicate; it does not synthesize the lipid-like structures; it lacks a cytoskeleton and a complex organization; the reactions going on are few and very simple. It is as much an eukaryotic cell as a neural net algorithm is a working brain.
However, it has working enzymes within little bubbles within other bubbles, which can be called "compartmentalization", a feature of eukaryotic cells that distinguish them from bacterial cells.
Nonetheless, this is a considerable achievment that has both a practical side and is a working model with potential to make in vitro experiments helping to understand the processes that go on in the real cells.
I'm a third grader, you insensitive clod!
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
So the Koalas will have something to eat then?
am I the only one who knows what every term used in the summary means?
No. I know what "previously" means because I've seen it, um, before.
Thats nothing. we've created an entire marine organism made of plastic. we track its age (it was born in 1988) and migratory habits throughout the seasons. we also monitor its feeding patterns and chart its growth too. remarkably enough it has almost no known predator, but seems enirely peaceful.
it might not really be alive but...i want to believe.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I, for one, welcome our new plastic overlords...
I reserve the right to be wrong.
Silicone life is born.
Is it "4: Informative" really? i thought it was "5: Funny" :-)
I fail to see what makes this cell Eukaryotic. I mean, sure, it's compartmentalized. But then, many bacterial cells are also compartmentalized. Prokaryote = no nucleus, Eukaryote = with nucleus, this cell = no nucleus.
The great robot evolution has begun!!
I got almost all terms. But what is "working"? ;-)
Activities that do not involve /.
-
Actually, modding it informative would have been funnier than modding it funny
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
I'm a third grader, you insensitive clod!
Well. based on today's standards, I could read at a 6th grade level in 3rd grade.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
This will be the technology that the dominant AI of the future will use ... to infiltrate our brains and make us mindless slaves to its will.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
Is copying mostly from existing DNA pattern actually 'creating'. They may have assembled the DNA bit by bit but the pattern that was largely the result of 3+billion years of evolution was used with a few 'mod's... - they did NOT create it all (totally new pattern) from scratch (and likely couldnt do that in a thousand years of future advancements)
The other thing is -- does this cell reproduce successfully -- the DNA it has built its own new 'plastic' cell membrane ??
The 'plastic' they used interacts with many cell mechanisms when part of the 'walls' (which BTW makes it a 'plant') - is this cell they created something that just lasted a little while and then strangled on the 'plastics' non-functioning in some important function ??
I hope not, given that it's written at a 6th grade level and it's only two sentences. But hey, if you're a 5th grader that's probably pretty good!
Or a college athlete.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
And THIS one should be modded funny instead of informative! :-)
Oh dear, I think that the Texas Education Board will go wild with excitement ! God is alive and well, working in a US lab !
At last! My slashdotter dream approacheth .....
No, but you are probably the only one who thinks that it is impressive that you do know it.
No.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Aren't you just the clever clogs.
I could read at the level of an adult in third grade.
http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Nestene_Consciousness http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auton