Showing posts with label bacteria. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bacteria. Show all posts

Six-Letter Genetic Code Creates New Life

    | .. .. Uniques life forms are being made in a laboratory a brave new world. genetic for code share twitter facebook reply report genetic science life replies genetic guardian dna synthetic code microbes australia romesberg media genetic on code it six-letter expanded research organisms edition scientists cells years forms genetic go code at six-letter rhysgethin email die living nature biology long adding letters god genetic if code in six-letter work material modified europe asia tech economy environment politics genetic at code to six-letter home create sign wrong times told life-forms change molecule team drugs bases molecules conditions masterclasses genetics prize editor humans molecular carry engineered published proteins | news stories | .. .. |
Beware, science is going down unexplored roads. Bacteria that are semi-synthetic are being created with a six-letter genetic code. New forms of life useful to Man could be on offer.  Hopefully, they will be used in medical treatment. | .. .. not stories news. | .. |
Base six DNA organism
"Normal" life has a base of four letters. Escherichia coli is a bacteria which has a synthetic pair of X and Y blended into it. The six bases stay together despite not conforming to the usual ruling double helix model.  | .. .. | australian| .. .. |   

The E. coli was manipulated to more readily take the pair into its DNA. Also the Y base was made easier for the searching enzymes to find. Bacteria that resisted the pair were selected out to create an ideal "host" E.coli. | .. .. | not. | .. ..

We are a long way from having practical helper organisms. Maybe ten years down the track there will something we can use. Until then it will remain a dream.    | .. .. | not | .. .. |
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There are 100 Million Unnamed Species


Biology - 100 million unnamed species exist on the planet.
We know that many species on the planet are dying out. Apparently, we have nothing to fear. Though 2 million species have been named, a massive 100 million more are out there. This does not include currently unnamed bacteria.

Using clear categories will never be an adequate way to name species. Like human gene pools that are blurred across the world it seems that animals are also on a graduated scale, looking alike while being genetically different.

Each living creature is placed in a species category because it has independent evolutionary lineage. A horse and donkey for example are different species, but they both have a common ancestor. If they do breed their offspring are infertile. There is debate about this with claims that some mules have had young. This gets into the argument about Neanderthals breeding with humans when they have a different number of chromosomes. Interbreeding should not be possible.
Brewer's Sparrow
Brewer's Sparrow
The problem with naming is that animals from two species can look virtually identical. The African elephant is a misnomer. There are actually two species: the bush elephant and the forest elephant. One is genetically distinct from the other.
Clay-colored Sparrow
Clay-colored Sparrow
Using clear categories will never be an adequate way to name species. Like human gene pools that are blurred across the world it seems that animals are also on a graduated scale, looking alike while being genetically different.
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BIR
species, animal, elephants, african, biology, evolution, bacteria, breed, donkey, horse, mule, offspring, infertile, chromosomes, articles news politics economics society anthropology historiography history sociology people nations country asia europe africa u.s. south america central Mediterranean eastern western interesting funny technology adventure australia blog australian blog free news
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Mysteries of 2015

KIC 8462852 star mystery
Well what happened in 2015? Some odd claims were made. In October KIC 8462852, a star doing strange things, was observed. Some said that it was created by intelligent life. Actually it is a comet swarm.

Bacon in frypan
The barbecue charcoal theory was taken a step further with suggestions that processed meat such as bacon causes cancer. However, the risk is statistically insignificant. Just don't eat too much of it.

Maunder Minimum London
NASA's mysterious EM Drive was announced which apparently is a microwave "powered" warp drive. Roll on Star trek. Thrust was produced from nothing but at a such a low level as to be unusable.

We do not have to worry about global warming because the sun will take care of it. The Maunder Minimum phase will push us into an ice age in the 2030s. Have no fear. Such a drastic 5º C fall will not happen. We have done far too much damage for the Maunder Minimum to have any effect.

Electron micrograph scan of tardigrade
The little Tardigrade creature picks up genes from the environment by horizontal transfer. That is why its DNA is a combination of virus, bacteria, fungi, plant and animal. This was the assertion anyway. Another research team ended the speculation when it found that only 36 genes were acquired by gene transfer, not the massive 6,000 plus in the earlier paper.

The world is a wonderful place, particularly when scientists get things wrong. We will still have to wait for the discovery of little green men. And what we do in our daily lives will always be suspect: saying that "the usual" is bad for us is easy to do and can cause short term panic.
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what happened in the year 2015 mysterious odd peculiar weird claims observations scientists papers articles news politics economics society anthropology historiography history sociology people nations country asia europe africa u.s. south america central Mediterranean eastern western interesting funny technology free news

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Caenorhabditis elegans Worm Travels by Slug Intestine

Everything is interrelated in this world. Nothing stands alone. Life itself is a community process. One animal lives with and off another. Indeed, many creatures cannot survive without the presence of particular others. Caenorhabditis elegans worms living "alongside" slugs is a case in point.
Caenorhabditis elegans worms
Slugs eat decomposing plants. Worms get a ride to new destinations by going through a slugs' intestines and being dropped out in poo in other locations. Consequently, worms can better exploit food resources. Surviving another animals digestive system is something unexpected.

C. elegans is the leading lab guinea pig. More is known about it than mice. However, its journey to regions anew has just been discovered. Moreover, they live on the surface of the ground not in the soil as previously supposed. Their food supply of bacteria and fungi are quickly exhausted so they have to move to new pastures.
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A Useful New Brew Tester: brewPal

Brewing goes high-tech. Well at least it does for small breweries. There is nothing worse than gulping down a cool stubbie and getting a flat, foul tasting experience. This seldom happens, of course, due to testing of the product in its creation.
Stubby beer from small Australian brewery
Invisible Sentinel has made a fantastic new product that solves most of the problems. A tiny device like a pregnancy tester called brewPal fits comfortably into your hand.  It analyses a beer's DNA and shows only one of two findings: either the beer is clear, or it has a spoiling infection.

When you exercise, lactic acid builds up in your body. This makes you feel tired. Excess lactic acid is also the cause of "off" beer. Unwanted bacteria produce the acid. Lactobacillus and Pediococcus are resistant to hops so they thrive in the brew. Oddly, some beers need these bacteria.

Culturing beer in the lab was time-consuming, especially in the hunt for Lactos and Pedis. It takes a week. Small companies can now test their beer with brewPal at the time of bottling to ensure a quality product. At last a company makes something really useful!
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Early Life Found in Western Australia's Pilbara Region

There is so much to be found in remote parts of Australia, new animal species and signs of early life. The first signs of life were bacteria and remains of them have been located in northwest Australia. They were in the Pilbara, in sedimentary rock.

Evidence of life billions of years old have come to light in Greenland, but with earth movement their date of origin cannot be accurately defined. Western Australia's Pilbara is stable so the find has been claimed as the earliest signs of life.

No fossils of the bacteria are left. Traces of their movement in the sediment can be clearly seen. Of course the soft sediment is now rock. There were masses of them in the Dresser Rock Foundation.

Examination of the tiny living things will help research of material on other planets. We now know what to look for. Planetary "rovers" can be built with the right testing equipment.
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Evolution by Ty Buchanan
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Protecting Children From the Environment Causes Disease in Old Age

When is human advancement and achievement not necessarily so? When improvement leads to deleterious side effects. There are theories that protection of children from the environment by medication and physical intervention causes such things as hay fever and autism. These are only theories and not proven.

Another issue is the massive intake of carbohydrates humans have taken into their bodies over the last ten thousand years. We have not evolved to digest the diet. For most of our evolution we lived on meat and fruit with tubers in small amounts.  Societies have changed a great deal.

There are now strong indications that Alzheimer's disease (AD) is caused by people keeping the environment too clean when children are toddling around. "Good" bacteria and viruses do not get into our bodies. It should be noted that the rate of Alzheimer's is rising only in wealthy nations. Lack of microbes could also be increasing strokes.

This seems to be an insurmountable problem. Do we let children catch diseases some of which can be deadly and crippling, or do we continue along our present path? Even providing clean drinking water reduces exposure to microorganisms. Perhaps science can develop ways of injecting the required T-cells into people. It is becoming an epidemic. The number of AD sufferers will treble by the year 2050. Some estimates put the rate higher.
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Cleanliness Causes Type 1 Diabetes

First we have a clean childhood leading to Crohn's disease. Now we have cleanliness causing type 1 diabetes. Both, apparently, are caused by the same thing - the lack of "bugs" in the stomach.

In the case of Crohn's disease it is the absence of worms. With diabetes it is too few bacteria. Tests on mice showed that a completely germ free environment when young increased the frequency of mice developing type 1 diabetes. Much fewer mice got diabetes when exposed to bacteria.

Future treatment could involve people taking medication containing bacteria. Potential sufferers of diabetes can already be identified by testing their genetic make-up.
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Health
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Vacuuming the House Is Dangerous for You

If you want to stay healthy don't vacuum your house. Have you ever done some hoovering and got a dry irritating cough? This could mean you need a new vacuum cleaner or should dump the existing one.

It is the way vacuum cleaners work that is the problem. They take in clumpy material which is caught in the filter bag. Very fine particles and bacteria get through and are pumped into surrounding air. If you are close-by, you breath in that foul air.

Top brands were tested including Hoover, Dyson, Electrolux, Sanyo and iRobot. When they were only six months old their HEPA filter systems failed. Allergens, bacteria and dust were pumped straight into the room.

Ideally we shouldn't have carpets in our homes at all. Having an industrial cleaner built into your home is the only answer. With these, dust is caught in a filtration unit outside of the house.
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