Humans' Big Brains Linked To a Small Stretch of DNA

A new study (abstract) described in the L.A. Times suggests that "just 10 differences on one particular strand of human DNA lying near a brain-development gene could have been instrumental in the explosive growth in the human neocortex." The DNA region, containing just 1,200 base pairs, is not a gene. But it lies near one that is known to affect early development of the human neocortex, according to the study, published online Thursday in Current Biology. Researchers showed that the region, known as HARE5, acts as an enhancer of the gene FZD8. Embryos of mice altered with human HARE5 developed significantly larger brains and more neurons compared with embryos carrying the chimp version, according to the study.

Comments

Look around you

[invictusvoyd]

Facebook , whatsapp .. HARE5 is certainly mutating .. some of the recent human DNA will make mice with smaller heads .. The world is going to be dumb eventually ..The dumb people make more babies .. The smart ones are still workin on that thesis they have to finish.

Re:Look around you

[GloomE]

I was going to moderate this.
But then I couldn't work out if it thought it mostly Flamebait, Troll, Redundant, Insightful, Interesting, Informative or Funny.

Re:Look around you

[TheRaven64]

The current size of the human head is limited by the pelvic size of women (humans already have a fairly high rate of mortality among newborns and mothers for unaided births compared to other species as a result). A more interesting approach would be to delay the age at which the head stops growing, though that would also need extra skeletal scaffolding to carry the larger head around, improvements to the cardiopulmonary system to keep it supplied with blood, and so on. Basically, the human brain is about as big as you can get it with small incremental changes to a hominid - you're going to need more than a few tweaks to get it a lot bigger.

Oh, and this isn't Twitter. You don't need to say '@GloomE' - we can tell from the fact that you replied to his post that you replied to his post.

life imitates art

[Anonymous Coward]

next time on Pinky & the Brain...

mice, HGTTG

[swell]

If we learned anything from The Hitchhiker's Guide, it is that the mice are the supreme species on earth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...
What's the point of injecting inferior genes into their brains?

On a more serious note, it will probably be a long time before genetic science can safely determine the source of intelligence or any way to manipulate it. And a long time beyond that to overcome social and legal impediments to using the knowledge in any practical way. Expect to be just as dumb as you are for the rest of your life.

Re:just 10 differences?

[invictusvoyd]

Then why doesn't someone make these 10 changes to a chimp egg and sperm and see what happens?

Planet of apes : rise of the funky monkey (3D)

In cinemas this season ....

Re:I.D.

[itzly]

But if it was evolution alone, other species would have it too

You assume that bigger brains offer a net benefit to other species. The problem is that large brains consume a large amount of energy. If the extra intelligence doesn't help to acquire extra food, the bigger brain is not a asset. Also, acquiring food is only part of the equation. Animals must also be able to actually eat and digest it. An animal like a cow already spends every waking moment on eating and digesting. Even if bigger brain could help it find more grass, there's still not enough time to actually process enough of it.

OMG, is this ethical?

[countach]

So they're breeding mice with the genes of a human brain? As Kramer said in that episode, there is a secret plan for pig men, or rather rat men.