On The Life Sciences Scene

Many Processes Involve Chromatin Remodeling

“Recovery of learning and memory is associated with chromatin remodeling”

http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/56016/

There is evidence that modulation of chromatin modification can facilitate extinction and prevent reinstatement of induced behavioral changes.

Activating chromatin modifications increase the accessibility of the chromatin to RNA polymerase, where repressing modifications decrease the accessibility to RNA polymerase. The repressing modifications cause the gene to become inactivated. Once the repressing modifications are removed the activating modifications attract transcription machinery, and the gene becomes activated.

Several distinct classes of enzyme can modify histones at multiple sites. "Epigenetics" refers to changes in phenotype or gene expression caused without change in the gene's DNA compositional sequence. These changes may remain through cell divisions for the remainder of the cell's life and may also last for multiple generations.

The treatment and conclusions in "Recovery of learning and memory is associated with chromatin remodeling" reminds me of old Soviet joke about biology experiment, measuring frog response. Data in the log:

Day 1: Commanded frog to jump. Frog jumped 2 feet.
Day 2: Amputated one foreleg. On voice command, frog jumped 18 inches.
Day 3: Amputated other foreleg. On voice command, frog jumped 12 inches.
Day 4: Amputated one rear leg. On voice command, frog jumped 6 inches.
Day 5: Amputated second rear leg. On voice command, frog displays deafness.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321

On Speech, And Pretentious Profundity Syndrome

A. From "A gene critical for speech"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/48680/title/A_gene_critical_for_speech
Scientists argue a newly discovered stretch of DNA essential for larynx development may have allowed the evolution of language.

One researcher posits that revved-up "tospeak" gene activity probably tweaks also the level of GDF6, gene that helps keep joints flexible, giving humans more flexible voice boxes than other primates. That advantage could have allowed humans to develop language.

Other researchers say that changes in the brain were probably far more important for the evolution of language than alterations of the larynx. “It is reasonable to expect that anatomical and physical changes have expanded our vocal repertoire,” says a geneticist, but “the idea that it’s the larynx that underlies speech is overly simplistic.”

"Brain changes that lead to language wouldn’t be possible without the capacity for speech", says another scientist, “You’ve got to have a brain [to speak], that’s true,” he says. “There must be a marriage between the brain and the structural capacity.”

B. We should all be grateful for the profundity of scientists like the above

The above abstract is a specimen of the many daily, still ongoing 20th century technology culture, "profound scientific works reports", that display this culture's PPS, Pretentious Profundity Syndrome, which serves to justify the claims of AAAS-type trade-unions and their members for budgets and for political, social and academic respect.

Again, science is not what it used to be when science was Science...

Dov Henis
(Comments from 22nd century)
"Societal Implications Of Science And Technology Evolution Since The 1920s"
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/61.page#215

Life's Is A Ubiquitous Evolution Mode

The mode of a gene's response to organism-culture's feedback signal, i.e. "replicate without change" or "replicate with change" in case of proven augmented energy constrainment by the offspring, is the mode of Life's normal evolution, which is the mode of evolution universally.

Genes' Expression Modification
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/200/122.page#3649

Again, the scope of of genes lifehood is not just the lifehood of genes.

Genes, and Life in general, are but one of the forms of mass, of constrained energy formats. The lifehood of genes is the foundation of the subject of evolutionary biology, which is a major component of the subject of life, which is a minute component of the subject of evolution of the universe, which is the subject for which humanity seeks a unified field theory.

Since the big-bang resolution of E/m superposition ALL the energy of the universe is destined for the galactic clusters expansion plus laying down of the gravity natrix for the eventual cosmic impansion, and ALL the mass is destined to revert to energy for these ends. The mass-to-energy reversion is resisted by the mass, this resistance being the archtype of selection for survival by all materials, including life. This resistance is due, exciting to us, to the fact that - as we know from everyday experience - formation of mass requires investment of energy, that dissipates when the mass disintegrates. And as we also know from everyday experience all energy forms other than gravity end up eventually as gravity energy. This is expected since ALL the contents of the universe are manifestations of the gravity energy freed at Inflation.

And again, a unified field theory is sought since unlike the evergrowing list of specific science/technology divisions drawn by the "scientists" trade-unions like the AAAS, the universe and Earth evolve as an integrated intertwined interrelated tangled whole and not as a collection of individual divisions.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Long-Term Space Travel Barrier
Due To Disrupted Bioclock

A. From "Disease proposed as major barrier to Mars and beyond"
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-10/foas-etf102909.php
Journal of Leukocyte Biology

"A new report appearing in the Journal of Leukocyte Biology argues that human missions to Mars, as well as all other long-term space flights might be compromised by microbial hitchhikers, such as bacteria. That's because long-term space travel packs a one-two punch to astronauts: first it appears to weaken their immune systems; and second, it increases the virulence and growth of microbes."

B. Both punches are most probably consequence of disrupted bioclock

See "From Genes To Identity" at
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/46762/title/From_Axons_to_Identity__Neurological_Explorations_of_the_Nature_of_the_Self_by_Todd_E._Feinberg

"Cooperation requires all sorts of interactions, including maintenance, protection and foraging for food-energy. Organisms' interactions are "cultures". Cultures require "cultural energy". Melatonin and some proteins are dark-and-light que signals evolved by the monocells communities for timing intercells processes when the intracells processes are at "sleep-inactive" state. Melatonin is a derivative of serotonin a derivative of triptophan, and proteins are genes' toolings, energy-dependent metabolism products."

I suggest that this is relevant to BOTH monocell organisms communities and multicell organisms, and decidedly refers also to the functionality of the immune system.

And I suggeast consideration of how to overcome the consequence of disrupted bioclock in seeking "understanding of how to maintain human health, disease-free survival after reaching Mars or establishing a colony on the Moon."

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Life Evolution In Ocean

A. "A new wrinkle in ancient ocean chemistry"
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-10/uoc--anw102309.php

A research team led by University of California, Riverside geoscientists has corroborated evidence that oxygen production began in Earth's oceans at least 100 million years before the Great Oxidation Event (GOE). The researchers analyzed 2.5 billion-year-old black shales, which revealed that episodes of hydrogen sulfide accumulation in the oxygen-free deep ocean occurred nearly 100 million years before the GOE. Scientists have long believed that the early ocean was characterized by high amounts of dissolved iron.

B. From "Life Is Simpler Than They Tell Us"
http://www.articlesbase.com/science-articles/life-is-simpler-than-they-tell-us-817144.html

Direct Sunlight To Metabolic Energy, Too.
Triptophan To Serotonin To Melatonin To Neural System.
Genes to Genomes To Monocellular Communities To Multicellular Organisms.

C. From "Proteins Not Early Life's Building Blocks"
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3190

Proteins have nothing to do with the initiation and evolution of early Earth's life, the biosphere. RNA's, followed with DNA's, were "life's building blocks", the constituents of the early independent genes, Earth's primal organisms.

Earliest and present primary Earth life are, obviously and commonsensibly, and therefore scientifically, genes. Plain and simple. All other organisms, regardless of complexity, are take-offs of genes. Early life was formed and maintained with DIRECT sunlight. Hence ubiquitous life sleep. Biometabolism, dependence of life on INDIRECT sunlight energy, was a very late phase of Earth's life evolution.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321

Loosely Used Science Terms
Shape Vague Comprehensions

Remarks re the first three paragraphs of "Speed Limit To The Pace Of Evolution, Biologists Say"
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091102171726.htm

1) "Pace of evolution"

*What is evolution? Define your work terms. Evolution is the process of enhancing of energy constraint.

2) "Darwinian evolution and/or non-Darwinian evolution".

*For the present science establishment Darwinian evolution implies what it implied for Darwin i.e. survival of randomly mutated multicelled organisms. For the present science establishment and for Motoo Kimura himself his neutral non-Darwinian evolution is a vague concept. For me, the 22nd century concept of evolution is Again And Again: It's Culture That Drives Evolution, Not Occasional Random Genetic Accidents:

http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#2806

3) "A major conclusion...for some organisms possibly including humans: continued evolution will not translate into ever-increasing fitness."

*Fitness is the capacity of an organism to survive. Don't lump humans with other organisms re the nature of capacity to survive. Ubiquitous biological survival capacity has been mostly by physiological adaptation to changing circumstances, whereas humans survive by modifying their environments-circumstances, by what anthropologists term culture.

4) "mutations at a constant rate -- a pattern long considered the hallmark of "neutral" or non-Darwinian evolution".

*Neutral or non-Darwinian evolution...hallmark pattern? These mutations are definitely normal accidental injuries sustained by inherited genes or genomes. Normal wear and tear of genes and genomes.

5) "Moreover, a population may accrue mutations at a constant rate -- a pattern long considered the hallmark of "neutral" or non-Darwinian evolution -- even when the mutations experience Darwinian selection".

*Even? What does this even imply here?

6) "Much is known about the qualitative aspects of evolutionary theory -- that organisms mutate and these mutations are selected by the environment..."

*No no no. Definitely not organisms mutate and these mutations are selected by the environment. Genes expressions are modified per cultural feedback of the organism.

7) "Information on evolution between consecutive generations is hard to come by, and the lack of understanding has real-world implications"

*What d'you know! Finally a correct statement! A pity, though, that the "Biologists" do not realize that it is hard to come by because they refuse to open their eyes and correct their concept of the origin, nature and mechanism of evolution.

I simply do not have time now to read beyond the first three paragraphs of "Speed Limit To The Pace Of Evolution, Biologists Say"...

Sadly exasperated,

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Evolution, With Compliments Of

"Breathtaking View, Offered With The Compliments Of XXX Company" - was a signboard I once saw next to a bench at an off-a-climbing-road mountain-top look-out.

Quotes from "Genetic Steps To Adaptation"
http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/56136/

1) "Genetic mutations -- occurring over just a few generations -- that allow bacteria to respond to environmental changes"

* No no no. Definitely not genetic mutations occurring over just a few generations that allow bacteria to respond to environmental changes. Genes expressions are modified per cultural feedback of the organism. It is culture that drives genetic changes, definitely not genetic changes that drive culture. Thus it is a Pavlovian process that drives an onset of genes', which are organisms, addiction. The addiction is NOT due to an accidental genes' mutation.

2) "We showed how evolution happens in real time"

* This time we are offered, with compliments of biologists, a view of evolution, the evolution each and every one of us sees all around us every second of our life, with the compliments of a biologist from Leiden University plus fellow scientists. How thrilling.

3) "bacteria and other organisms can switch back and forth between phenotypes to better survive in new environments", "The results thus suggest that phenotypic switching is a strategy that can readily evolve, and may capture the earliest evolutionary solutions to life in fluctuating environments"

* With sad exasperation I suggest that this is NOT A RARE, BUT A FREQUENT, demonstration of scientists observing and recording data properly yet coming to a pre-experiment-upsidedown-ideefixe factually wrong conclusion. It is not that the evolution they observe is upside-down. It is their concept of evolution that is upside-down.

Sadly suggesting,

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)

Phantom Limbs, Pavlov And Genes Lifehood

Phantom limb = an often painful sensation of the presence of a limb that has been amputated, called also phantom pain.

A. From "Redefining self, phantom self"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/48810/title/Redefining_self%2C_phantom_self
Amputees who feel phantom limbs can learn to do physically impossible body tricks

Recently amputees have learned to mentally manipulate their phantom limbs into anatomically impossible configurations through thinking alone. "It is very surprising that anybody, amputees or not, can learn impossible movements just by thinking about it,” comments a neuroscientist.

Until now treatment of phantom limb pain required a brain-environment conversation, a visual feedback. But recent work suggests that persons with a distorted body self-image may be able to alter it by imagining a change to the body. And those getting neural reconstructive surgery may be able to practice using their new body parts by simply imagining their use, says a coauthor of the work. This shows that body image is constructed in a dynamic manner; it can be changed.

Even though we have an inbuilt sense of what’s physically impossible and what is not, body image turns out to be extraordinarily plastic. We think of ourselves as stable people with a stable body image, but we can inhabit a body that cannot exist in the physical world.

B. From "More On The Lifehood Of Genes, that makes each and all organisms alive"
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/160/122.page

'Why Pavlov smiled in 2008 "
http://www.sciencenews.org/index/feature/activity/view/id/39046/title/Imagination_Medicine

Pavlov demonstrated effecting placebo phenomena in multicelled organisms by manipulation of their drives-reactions. Now placebo and imagination phenomena are demonstrated also in Life's primal organisms, in genes and genomes, in our first stratum and 2nd stratum base organisms. A very good reason for him to smile. What makes this possible? It is possible simply since these are, too, organisms.

So, if it is not the lifehood of genes that makes each and all organisms alive, what otherwise makes each and all organisms alive?

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Of Primate Fingers And Nostril

Quotes from "Hormone That Affects Finger Length Key To Social Behavior"

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091104101553.htm

1) "Research at the universities of Liverpool and Oxford into the finger length of primate species has revealed that cooperative behavior is linked to exposure to hormone levels in the womb."

* Unbelievable. A unique and novel revelation. What will they reveal next? They might next reveal that the origin of social cooperative behaviour is in cooperative behaviour of cells in a multicelled organism, or even earlier in a cooperative behaviour of monocell organisms in their hormoned communities (cultures), or even earlier in cooperative behaviour of genes in a genome, or - Heaven Forfend - even earlier in cooperative behaviour of molecules, and even earlier of atoms, yes, atoms, to form self-replicating energy constraining genes on Earth to prevent some of it's sun-star energy from serving as fuel for the expansion of galactic clusters.... You mean that everything, yes everything, goes back to the Big Bang? Unbelievable! Why, this turns out to having revealed that everything in the universe, on Earth and life are all evolving intertwiningly! Unbelievable!

2) "Research from finger ratios may help us understand more clearly the development of human sociality and its evolutionary origins."

* I suggest that research of evolution of the coordinated structures and dimensions of human's nose-picking finger and nostril may help us understand more clearly the development of human profundity and its evolutionary origins.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Unscientific America Leads Unscientific World

Book: "Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future"
by Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/49201/title/Unscientific_America_How_Scientific_Illiteracy__Threatens_Our_Future_by_Chris__Mooney_and_Sheril_Kirshenbaum

I have not read the book, but I have been e-posting about the subject during the past ten years. E-posting and not print-publishing, because IMO the print-published science-world is polluted and science-stifling. And IMO and at my advanced age it's about time that science accept and treat and exploit e-media as an equal to print-published media.

Having e-posted about the Societal Implications Of The 20th Century Technology Culture, IMO the core essential scientific illiteracy is inherent and common to BOTH the public at large AND the "scientists", who are an integral part of the public at large. The illiterarcy-uncertainty starts right at the foundation with the vagueness of the term "scientist" that is rightly placed here in quot'n marks.

IMO the 20th century technology culture is inherently a world-wide unscientific culture, fostered and led by an unscientific American culture, originated, developed and made omnipresent and omnipotent by the AAAS, essentially a "scientists" old-style trade-union evolved by now into a political guild-establishment.

See
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45198/title/Science_Future_for_July_18,_2009

Science future and scientific literarcy face a challenge of assessing the nature of the Science Establishment and considering if-how-whereto change its nature, organization and its charter.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)

Right-Handedness Evolution,
Culture-Genetics Relationship

A. From "Aping the Stone Age"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/49158/title/Aping_the_Stone_Age
Chimp chasers join artifact extractors to probe the roots of stone tools

Converging lines of evidence indicate that wild chimps indeed invent distinctive types of tools within communities, and these tools get passed from one generation to the next as a kind of cultural legacy

For roughly 50,000 generations, Oldowan toolmaking techniques got passed from hominid experts to novices. In recent experiments, it was found that captive chimps display a similar capacity for learning how to use tools by observing more experienced comrades.

One of the projects combines chimp, hominid and modern human data to explore the enduring mystery of why most people are right-handed. Judging by stone tools, by at least 120,000 years ago right-handedness frequently occurred among Neandertals, and archaeological record from ancient Homo sapiens that lived during the same time as Neandertals shows similar signs of a right-handed skew. Most Oldowan toolmakers from nearly 2 million years ago were probably right-handed. However, whereas wild chimp communities display a variety of hand preferences, a trend of relatively stronger right- and left-handedness does appear in chimp groups that regularly use tools, such as nut-cracking stones or sticks for poking into termite mounds to remove the edible insects.

Researchers suspect that "specific genes contribute to human hand preferences". Uomini hypothesizes that people and chimps share a genetic propensity to use one hand more than another on tasks that demand dexterity. Genes for right-handedness, though, have evolved in humans alone, she proposes.

B. Adnauseam, it is culture that drives genetic changes, NOT genetics that drives cultural changes

"Specific genes contribute to human hand preferences"? Read this above abstract again and again. Note: First comes culture. Genetics follows culture. Genes propagate in an expression conformation that maintains their evolved energy constrainment level. If/when their higher stratum take-off organism attains an enhanced level of energy constrainment the genes modify their expression accordingly. This is the drive and direction of life's evolution. This is how the horses are harnessed, to the front of the wagon, not to the rear.

C. And also adnauseam, right-handedness is NOT an enduring mystery
http://www.articlesbase.com/science-articles/genes-are-organisms-earths-primal-organisms-805441.html

Just as life's chirality was the best energy-constraining product of the early, direct sun energy fueled independent genes and therefore it was selected to survive, so a preferred-handedness proved energetically advantageous, and since it happened to start with right-handedness it has been since then inducing genetic expression adjustment. And since humans, and even primates, are just fresh young novel organisms on Earth, the process is still going on, not yet completed. Just wait and see. When you return to Earth one-two million years from now you'll hardly find any left-handed people.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Melatonin Cues Intercell Maintenance,
Not "involved" In Sleep Regulation

A. From "Hormones give lantern sharks the glow"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/49291/title/Hormones_give_lantern_sharks_the_glow
In a first, a study shows that bioluminescence can be controlled by slow-acting hormones, not rapid-fire nerve cells.

- " Melatonin, which in humans is an important hormone for sleep regulation, induced a slow, long-lasting glow in the skin patches that persisted for several hours, researchers show."

- "Many animals secrete more melatonin when the long nights of winter arrive."

B. From "Life Is Simpler Than They Tell Us"
http://www.articlesbase.com/science-articles/life-is-simpler-than-they-tell-us-817144.html

In monocellular organisms communities, cooperation requires all sorts of interactions, including maintenance, protection and foraging for food-energy. Organisms' interactions are "cultures". Cultures require "cultural energy". Melatonin and some proteins are dark-and-light cue signals evolved by the monocells communities for timing intercells processes when the intracells processes are at "sleep-inactive" state. Melatonin is a derivative of serotonin a derivative of triptophan, and proteins are genes' toolings, energy-dependent metabolism products.

Now we can appreciate the fractal nature of life's evolution. It is ever-continuous ever-enhanced ever-complexed cooperation, for ever more enhanced energy constraint. Now we can understand why, and grosso modo how, all the organs and processes and signals found in multicelled organisms have their origins in the monocells communities. And this includes the functions of serotonin and melatonin and, yes, the evolution of neural cells and the neural systems with their intricate outer-membrane shapes and functionings and with their high energy consumption requirements.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)

How Human Language Evolved
Exasperating Scientific Illiteracy

(Illiterate = marked by a lack of acquaintance with the fundamentals of a particular field of knowledge )

A. From "Genetic effects suggest FOXP2 role in language evolution"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/49468/title/Genetic_effects_suggest_FOXP2_role_in_language_evolution
Human version of the protein alters activity of 116 genes compared with the chimp version.

- Scientists have suspected that those two amino acid changes were not merely cosmetic, but might alter the way FOXP2 functions, PERHAPS PAVING THE WAY FOR THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE.

- FOXP2 and the genes it regulates make the brain better able to integrate sensory information with movements, as in hearing sounds and then shaping the tongue, lips and vocal tract to reproduce those sounds.

- Genes regulated by FOXP2 make up a subset of all the genes known to have different levels of activity in the brains of humans and chimps. The protein and the genes it influences account for about 20 percent of the changes in gene activity seen between the two species, the researchers discovered.

- Change two amino acids and suddenly we speak? It’s not so. The new study does show important functional differences between the human and chimp versions of the protein, and may lead to a BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE MOLECULAR BASIS OF LANGUAGE EVOLUTION. We are still some way off from describing how differences in FOXP2 alter the properties and behavior of neurons in the living brain.

B. "Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future"
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/220/122.page#4165

"Seed of Human-Chimp Genomes Diversity"
http://profiles.yahoo.com/blog/2SF3CJJM5OU6T27OC4MFQSDYEU?num=5&max=160&start=30
2 Nov,2005 Dov, in biologicalEvolution forum

Chapter Four, In which appears genetic evidence/demonstration of the workings of human cultural evolution.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Deciphering Life's Regulatory Code

To : Robert P. Zinzen, EMBL Heidelberg

Re : "Deciphering the regulatory code"

A. From "EMBL scientists take new approach to predict gene expression"
http://www.embl.de/aboutus/communication_outreach/media_relations/2009/091104_Heidelberg/index.html

"What’s exciting for me is that this study shows that it is possible to predict when and where genes are expressed, which is a crucial first step towards understanding how regulatory networks drive development”

B. Organism's behaviour, its reactions to its environments, are "regulatory networks"?

The above statement by Furlong, translated to 22nd century comprehension, amounts to:

What’s exciting is that this study shows that it is possible to predict when and where organisms react to their environments, which is a crucial first step towards understanding how evolution proceeds.

C. Please consider the following suggestions of the origin and nature of life and organisms, and of the origin and nature of cosmic and life evolution

- Genes, Earth's primal organisms, and all their take-off organisms - Life in general - are but one of the cosmic forms of mass, of constrained energy formats.

- The on-going cosmic mass-to-energy reversion since the Big-Bang inflation is resisted by mass, this resistance being the archtype of selection for survival by all forms of mass, including life.

- The mode of genes', Earth's primal organisms, response to the cultural feed-back signals reaching them from their upper stratum take-off organism is "replicate without change" or "replicate with change". "Replicate with change" is selected in case of proven augmented energy constrainment by the new generation, this being "better survival". This mode of Life's normal evolution is the mode of energy-mass evolution universally.

Suggesting for your consideration,

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Corn Genome And More

A. From "Corn genome a maze of unusual diversity"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/49808/title/Corn_genome_a_maze_of_unusual__diversity
Multiple teams announce complete draft of the maize genome, with a full plate of surprises that include hints about hybrid vigor.

- Although corn was domesticated only 8,000 to 10,000 years ago from the grass teosinte, the genetic diversity between any two strains of corn exceeds that found between humans and chimpanzees, species separated by millions of years of evolution. Much of the maize strains diversity is most probably due to the action of transposable elements, better known as jumping genes. Transposons and other repeated pieces of DNA make up 85 percent of the maize genome in the B73 strain, that has about 32,000 genes.

- Hybrid vigor: Often, when two inbred varieties of corn are crossed, the hybrid (shown center) is more robust and yields more than either parent (shown left and right). Corn's newly decoded genome may help scientists decipher the source of this hybrid vigor. In thousands of genes of B73/Mo17 maize strains hybrids, only the copy inherited from the male parent was active. This genetic phenomenon of only one parent’s gene being active is called imprinting. The researchers don’t know how or if imprinting contributes to hybrid vigor.

- The researchers also uncovered evidence that maize strains are CREATING NEW GENES and losing others. In fact, thousands of pieces of DNA found in one strain are completely missing from the other.

- “In other species, it’s a rare individual that has active transposons,” Walbot says, because active transposons have the potential to disrupt crucial genes. But the strategy has worked for corn, allowing its genome to nimbly adapt to changing environmental conditions, often from generation to generation. But, the species could also, eventually, split into multiple species.
Corn is living in peril, you might say. It has these features that allow flexibility in its genome, but there’s a cost to running this game.”

B. The subject obviously warrants the extensive multiple team effort and the data gleaned so far warrants a continuation of this grand project.

But a few remarks about the subject sciencenews report:

- An evolutionary contrast, for any purpose, of genomes of strains of corn domesticated only 8,000-10,000 yr ago with genomes of human-chimpanzee species separated by millions of years, is strange. The twain are not comparable. All genes-genomes, except human's, evolve by physiological adaptation to changing circumstance, whereas human genes-genomes, ONLY human genes-genomes,evolve in conjunction with change-control of circumstances. This is the ONLY evolved difference between humans and other organisms, THE difference that led also to virtual reality, i.e. to "spirituality".

( For religious persons, this may be the idea of Genesis 1:26. "Then God said Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth". OK, let's not indulge in How Man Rules...)

- Researchers don’t know how or if imprinting contributes to hybrid vigor? Genetics don't initiate a course of expression modifications (unless by accident). It is the corn's culture, its vigor, that leads to the genetic modifications, to modified expressions, by feedback to the genome. The feedback is "Replicate with change, here is a case of proven augmented energy constrainment". This mode of Life's normal evolution is the mode of energy-mass evolution universally. Survival ( from reverting to energy ) is the moto of each and every form of mass in the universe, not only of life.

- Evidence that maize strains are CREATING NEW GENES?

- “In other species, it’s a rare individual that has active transposons”. Maybe the genetic uniqueness of corn is a result of its extensive and varied cultivation, and maybe its apparent genetic male imprinting is in fact a result of best survival expression at given circumstances...

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

An LHC Thinking Break
In The 20th/21st-Centuries Technology Culture Maze Rat Race

A. Main purposes of the LHC (its first high-energy collisions to be attempted early 2010)

Expected to address most fundamental questions of physics, that are said to block further progress in understanding the cosmic evolution. Planned-built with intention of testing predictions of high-energy physics, mainly:

- Existence of the hypothesized Higgs boson(s), for completing the Standard Model, to explain the origin of mass in the universe,

- Do all known particles have supersymmetric partners, for clearing up the mystery of dark matter,

- Are there extra dimensions as postulated by models inspired by string theory.

B. Let's get off the 20th/21st centuries technology culture maze rat race, and take a thinking break:

The study of cosmic evolution concerns and affects the study and comprehension of each and every subject in the universe. Cosmic evolution originated with gravity, which originated with inflation.

Progress in understanding the cosmic evolution starts with Thinking. Every experiment on the course of its study starts with Thinking. Per my thinking (small t, of course)
E=Total[m(1 + D)] represents the essence of cosmic evolution. E of the universe is constant, and the variables of E are the extents of its mass formats and their density. And this is the archteype of configuration for the origin of mass anywhere. Production of an amount of m in a one-shot process takes an amount of E that renders D zero. In a one-shot process a superduper squeeze to overcome D is required to achieve an E-m superposition. This is to be attempted at the LHC, with the highest amount of energy now feasible for us, which is a diminutively minuscule amount for the purpose.

Many formats of mass are not formed from energy in a one-shot process, but in series of processes consisting of totalities of multitudes of small partial intermediate steps. Life is an example. As in life's genesis and survival. It took energy to originate life, in the form of genes, and it takes energy to continuously replicate it, to replicate the genes, life's primal organisms. And it took energy to initiate formation and carry on the evolution of the pre-life mass formats that eventually complexed into genes, etc., all the way back to inflation. Monotheism is the E-m superposition.

Cosmic evolution is also called particle physics or evolutionary biology or complexing or other terms. The LHC high-energy collisions will most probably advance our comprehension of it even if, as I expect, it will fail to demonstrate that the origin of mass in the universe depends on the hypothesized Higgs boson(s) and will fail to demonstrate the existence of dark matter or energy. I avoid the "extra dimensions" since they are beyond my simple-minded comprehension. Per my commonsensical concept of cosmic evolution everything started with inflation and will eventually revert to singularity.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

It Is Culture That Sets Evolution's Rate
It Is Genes That Evolve Expressions

Unbelievable! Evolution Rate Seems To Be "Species Specific"!

Quotes from "Penguin DNA evolving faster than thought"
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/49671/title/Penguin_DNA_evolving_faster_than_thought

- "One of the most basic assumptions is that the rate of evolution is the same in all species. Now, the new study provides evidence that, at least for Ad?lie penguins, evolution is happening faster than previously thought. This is a beautiful study. Some people have been saying this for a long time, but no one has shown this in such a systematic way.”

*** Unbelievable! These statements display a complete illiterate misunderstanding of the origin, nature and mechanism of evolution. Stated in a 21st century sciencenews article!

- "Comparing the DNA in modern birds to that in ancient generations shows molecular evolution happens at varying rates, and that each species has its own rate of evolution."

*** Unbelievable! What an exciting new discovery! An exhilarating find!

- "A study of DNA from ancient and modern Adelie penguins suggests that scientists may have miscalculated the rates at which genetic clocks tick off evolutionary time in other species as well"

*** "Genetic clocks tick off evolutionary time"! How poetically, dramatically, sophisticatedly scientific!

- "But each part of the circular mitochondrial genome evolves at different rates, the team found".

*** Realy? You don't say! Here are all these genes next to each other in the circular genome and the next thing you know someone might want to convince you that each of these genes is an organism, even if they are all interdependent in the genome. What d'you know!

- "“When you’re extrapolating one group's evolution rates to another group, there’s a very good chance it’s an underestimate,”

*** Sorry, mate. When you’re extrapolating one group's rates to another group, there’s a certainty it's an evolution illiteracy. Plain and simple.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Upgrade Evolution Comprehension Beyond Darwin

A. From "Asymmetry switched in snail (by manipulation)"
http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/56187/

This altered handedness, however, did not pass from generation to generation; offspring of (manipulated) reversed-coiled snails reclaimed the pre-manipulated orientations of their ancestors, suggesting the physical manipulations by researchers did not affect the genetically programmed structural pattern.

B. Again and again: Upgrade Evolution Comprehension Beyond Darwin

Physical manipulations that do not result in augmented energy constrainment by the organism do not affect the expression of its primal organism, the gene. (PS: why refer to an organism as "genetically programmed structural pattern"?. Are we genetically programmed structural patterns?)

Please consider the following concept of the origin and nature of life and organisms, of the origin and nature of cosmic and life evolution:

- Genes, Earth's primal organisms, and all their take-off organisms - Life in general - are but one of the cosmic forms of mass, of constrained energy formats.

- The on-going cosmic mass-to-energy reversion since the Big-Bang inflation is resisted by mass, this resistance being the archtype of selection for survival by all forms of mass, including life.

- The mode of genes', Earth's primal organisms, response to the cultural feed-back signals reaching them from their upper stratum take-off organism is "replicate without change" or "replicate with change". "Replicate with change" is selected in case of proven augmented energy constrainment by the the new generation, this being "better survival". This mode of Life's normal evolution is the mode of energy-mass evolution universally.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

Updated Physical Evolution Defintion Dec 1 2009

A. Three present definitions of physical evolution, at

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/evolution

- a process of change in a certain direction.

- a theory that the various types of animals and plants have their origin in other preexisting types and that the distinguishable differences are due to modifications in their successive generations, and also the process described by this theory.

- a process in which the whole universe is a progression of interrelated phenomena.

B. Suggested updated physical evolution definition, of Life's normal evolution and universal energy-mass evolution.

a theory, and the process described by it, that the whole universe changes in a progression of interrelated phenomena of mass formats attaining temporary augmented energy constraint in their successive generations with energy drained from other mass formats, to temporarily postpone, survive, reverting of their mass to the cosmic energy fueling the galactic clusters expansion.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108

What Are Evolutionary Responses

Quantifying evolutionary responses requires, first, definition of evolution. You cannot measure what you cannot define.

A. Quotes from "How can scientists measure evolutionary responses to climate change?"
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-11/w-hcs113009.php

- "As global temperatures continue to rise scientists are presented with the complex challenge of understanding how species respond and adapt."

*** "How species respond and adapt" is plainly and simply what is the nature and mechanism of evolution.

- "Understanding biological responses to global climate warming can be dauntingly complex, but primarily it requires careful quantification of the rates of temporal change."

*** "Biological responses" are "quantified rates of temporal change", which are parameters of biological evolution.

B. Quotes from "Variable temperatures leave insects with a frosty reception"
http://communications.uwo.ca/com/western_news/stories/variable_temperatures_leave_insects_with_a_frosty_reception_20091125445337/

- "Insects exposed to repeated periods of cold will trade reproduction for immediate survival."
- "In past research insects survived cold better if periodically exposed to warm conditions."
- "The data were tracked number, sex and development time of offspring."

*** What is "survived cold better". Experimental observations and data in this type of study are correct if they are of communities, not of individual insects, and if the temporal parameters are nearest to natural. "Better survival" is, genetically, a broad community term, not an individual organism term. In evolutionary survival the individual hardly counts. It is hardly aught. It is the community, the total mass format, that counts. And the mass format counts because it is IT that represents factual successful survival, i.e. factual augmentation of replication, i.e. of overall constrained energy. And it is THIS feedback to the genome that causes replication of the involved gene(s) with accordingly modified expression(s).

This is the reason why individual life, an organism, is the cheapest commodity on Earth. For universal evolution it is the total Earth biomass that counts, not any individual organism. You see this everywhere all around you.

C. Quantifying evolutionary responses requires, then, first, definition of evolution. You can measure what you can define.

Dov Henis
(Comments From The 22nd Century)
Updated Life's Manifest May 2009
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/140/122.page#2321
Implications Of E=Total[m(1 + D)]
http://www.the-scientist.com/community/posts/list/180/122.page#3108