Squid can edit their own genes
Source:
Squid, which many of us love to eat, can be even more extraordinary than previously thought. As it turned out, these creatures from the squad desjatinogih cephalopods have an incredible ability to genetic editing. When setting up your own RNA, organisms have learned to affect my nervous system for survival in nature. Can this discovery help in the development of new treatments for severe neurological disorders in humans and how squid are associated with technology ?
RNA (Ribonucleic acid) is included in the composition of cells the molecules that are involved in gene activities. Squid can configure these molecules so that their nervous system was more adapted to environmental conditions.
CRISPR is a tool for editing genes. Thanks to it, scientists can endow organisms with new properties in just a few days.
How to treat a neurological disorder?
Perhaps, the method of treatment of human diseases could seem a rather extravagant idea, if not one “but”: in a short time it can really be armed with the doctors and pharmacists. The fact that the squid turned out to be able to influence RNA responsible for the encoding and reading of genes. So, although human genes remain the same throughout his life encoded in them, the information can be transmitted to the next generation, says the portal .
Similar processes also apply to RNA, which like DNA is not changed in the body. So, at the moment of release of RNA from the nucleus, the genetic information it carries, may not be highly distorted. However, this seemingly impossible phenomenon is happening in the bodies of the squid. Independently tuning the nervous system, the largest clams in the world may be some of the most incredible things on the planet, at the same time able to teach human science, a couple of useful tricks.
In order to test this hypothesis, a team of researchers took samples of nerves from adult male long-tailed coastal squid (Doryteuthis pealeii), then analyzing the properties of the protein of the organism and its genome. As a result of the experiment revealed that in the nerves of the squid RNA editing outside of the nucleus in a particular part of the cell called the axon. In this place the body of the squid leads the precise configuration of the proteins, thus replacing well-known to many . This technology is currently considered one of the newest tools person to edit the information encoded in the cells of a living organism, and thus may even save people from hereditary diseases.
the Crispr Technology — the newest tool of the man to change the properties of an organism
So, why squid needs to change its RNA? Despite the fact that researchers have not yet managed to come to an understanding in this question, scientists already have some ideas for a natural purpose “of a natural gene editing”. So, it is possible that octopuses, cuttlefish and squid use the edit RNA in order to diversify the proteins produced in the nervous system. Such property may somehow affect the level of intelligence of these animals, which, as you might know, is much higher than other invertebrates.
Overall, the idea that genetic information may be edited inside a living organism can greatly expand our understanding about possibilities of future medicine. Using knowledge of the customization capabilities of proteins inside the cell, we were able to successfully treat even those neurological diseases and disorders that are currently recognized as incurable. In addition, editing of RNA can be much safer in performance than even when editing deoxyribonucleic acid.
Hi-News.ru previously been told that squid is able to “teach” humanity not only in the development of genetically modifying technologies and creating useful space technologies. More about this you can read .
the typical length of squids is equal to 0,25—0,5 meters, but the squid of the species Architeuthis reach 16.5 meters
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