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Photosynthesizing Sea Slugs Steal Genes From Algae
An anonymous reader writes For decades, scientists have puzzled over how a certain sea slug acquires the ability to photosynthesize after ingesting algae. An advanced imaging technique now confirms that the slugs are literally stealing genes from the algae. It's considered the first example of horizontal gene transfer in a multicellular organism.
Holy crap, they're GMO! I demand they be labeled as such right now!
... it's copyright infringement.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
But I know many multicellular intelligent organisms that have engaged in horizontal gene transfer. Many of them probably shouldn't have.
Silence is a state of mime.
Note: all WH40K cosplayers better suit up...
Do you know why the road less traveled by is littered with the bones of the unwary?
Sounds like some sort of euphemism...
I may be too optimistic but this could become a really nice laboratory tool once the exact mechanism of genetic transfer is known and replicated, gene cloning independent from plasmid or simplified transfection would be very useful for genetic engineering. Imagine easily cultured cells that not only can accept various genetic materials but actively incorporate them into their genome, "gene cloning for dummies" kits for one-step protein expression.
> It's considered the first example of horizontal gene transfer in a multicellular organism.
Now that we know horizontal gene transfer happens in nature, that should lay to rest any arguments that GMOs are unsafe, after all it is exactly the same thing just man-made in a lab where it can be tested.
Because transferring food-making genes into an inedible organism is just the same as transferring poison-making genes into your food.
The slugs at some point in their past acquired the genes from algae that are required to maintain/repair the chloroplasts that each one collects from the algae they eat. The horizontal gene transfer is (presumably) not an ongoing process but something that happened in their distant past.
The baby slugs start eating algae and they digest most of them but they save the chloroplasts from the algae cells and integrate them into their own tissue. Once they accumulate enough of them they basically become solar powered and don't need to eat anymore.
Normally the chloroplasts would not survive very long without an algae around them to take care of them, but this is where the genes that the slug has that originally came from the algae come into play. The slug is thus able to provide the things that its adopted chloroplasts need to survive for many months.
Definitely very cool.
G.
It might be pointed out that plants' chloroplasts and our mitochondria are now well-understood to have originated as "ingested" bacteria that, rather than being broken down and digested, ended up first as internal symbionts, and were over time transformed into the cells' internal organs. What these slugs are doing is somewhat similar to this, though on a somewhat smaller scale. The slugs apparently only nab a few chromosomes from the algae, and transfer them into their own digestive-system cells.
But the "first" in the article is a bit different from this: They describe it as the first-known such transfer between two multi-cellular species. Our mitochondria seem to have originated in a single-cell ancestor similar to an amoeba, which incorporated an entire living bacterium as an internal resident. Similarly, plant chloroplasts are believed to have originated as photosynthetic bacteria that were incorporated whole into early algae. In both of these cases, there has been gene transfer from the internal bacteria into the eukaryotic cell's nucleus, leaving the mitochondria and chloroplasts with mostly just the genes needed to do their job, and unable to survive outside their host cell.
But the slugs took a different route, of separating out the photosynthesis genes from their food's cells, moving the DNA into the slugs' cells, and digesting the rest of the algal cells as food.
It could be interesting to stick around and see how this works out. Eventually, they might be able to incorporate the photosynthetic mechanism into their own genome, so that when a slug cell divides, it'll get copies of of these genes and won't have to steal them from algae. Plants never never did this, because they maintained their chloroplasts' ability to divide within the plant cell (with a bit of help from the host cell). The slug's approach might turn out better than the plants'. Or maybe it won't. Or maybe it'll just be two different approaches to photosynthesis that both work well enough.
But we might not know about this for a few more millennia ...
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
Erm... Monsanto GM modifications are open source. The sequence of nucleotides and the method of their insertion is clearly described in these patents: https://www.google.com/patents... , https://www.google.com/patents... and other related patents. Feel free to use them, they are expired as of the last year.
The Bt gene is a 'poison making gene' in the same sense that grapes are poison berries; just because a thing harms one organism (in the case of Bt, lepidopterans and coleopterans and in the case of grapes dogs) does not mean it hurts you. The Bt toxin is very well understood; to imply it is dangerous to humans is simply dishonest.
So one is saying trust Monsanto (or Syngenta or Pioneer or any of the other seed companies that always get neglected for some reason). I am, however, saying the evidence is overwhelming that genetically engineered crops are safe and effective (and yes, contrary to the conspiracy theories claiming that Monsanto somehow owns the concept of genetic engineering, this includes research that has nothing to do with corporations) and that genetic engineering has been thoroughly demonstrated to be a useful tool for crop improvement. Those are two totally different statements; don't pretend otherwise.
Why can't Monsanto open source everything?
Why can't they work for free you mean? I can think of a few reasons.
You know, if you really want more GE crops that are free to use besides the ones going off patent, and I for one sure do, then you should demand that the scientifically unjustified over-regulation of GE crops be reworked to facilitate more publicly funded GE crops. Thus far, only one university developed GE crop has been released: the Rainbow papaya, developed by the University of Hawai'i. There is also Bt eggplant in Bangladesh which is non-corporate. There's plenty of research, but no ability to bring it to the market anymore thanks to over regulation. There's something very wrong when university research cannot be used and only corporations can overcome the regulatory hurdles.
Oxygen is toxic, water is toxic, nitrogen is toxic. Please define the safe allowance of such poison and how much is actually ingested.