Posted on 09/03/2004 6:49:50 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers are proposing that the first battle for survival-of-the-fittest might have played out as a simple physical duel between fatty bubbles stuffed with genetic material. The scientists suggest that genetic material that replicated quickly may have been all the bubbles needed to edge out their competitors and begin evolving into more sophisticated cells.
This possibility, revealed by laboratory experiments with artificial fatty acid sacs, is in sharp contrast to a current theory of the earliest evolution of cells, which suggests that cellular evolution was driven by primordial genetic machinery that actively synthesized cell membranes or otherwise influenced cell stability or division.
The researchers, led by Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator Jack W. Szostak, published their findings in the September 3, 2004, issue of the journal Science. Szostak and first author Irene Chen, both from Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, collaborated on the studies with Richard Roberts of the California Institute of Technology.
Cells are basically sacs encapsulated by bilayered membranes of fatty acids and other lipids, plus proteins. A central question in evolution is how simple versions of these cells, or vesicles, first arose and began the process of competition that drove the evolution of life.
"Most of the previous thinking about how cells grew and evolved was based on the idea of the initial evolution of structural RNAs or ribozymes -- enzymes that could synthesize membrane molecules," said Szostak. The ribozymes might have made more membrane material while the structural RNAs might have formed a cytoskeleton that influenced stability, shape, growth or division, he said. However, Szostak and his colleagues theorized that a far simpler physical process might explain why cells would compete with one another for the materials necessary to expand their size.
"We proposed that the genetic material could drive the growth of cells just by virtue of being there," he said. "As the RNA exerts an osmotic pressure on the inside of these little membrane vesicles, this internal pressure puts a tension on the membrane, which tries to expand. We proposed that it could do so through the spontaneous transfer of material from other vesicles nearby that have less internal pressure because they have less genetic material inside."
In order to test their theory, the researchers first constructed simple model "protocells," in which they filled fatty-acid vesicles with either a sucrose solution or the same solvent without sucrose. The sucrose solution created a greater osmotic pressure inside the vesicles than the solvent alone. The membranes of the simple vesicles were not as sophisticated as the membranes of today's living cells, said Szostak. However, they closely resembled the kinds of primordial vesicles that might have existed at the beginning of evolution.
When the scientists mixed the two vesicles, they observed that the ones with sucrose - in which there was greater membrane tension - did, indeed, grow by drawing membrane material from those without sucrose.
"Once we had some understanding that this process worked, we moved on to more interesting versions, in which we loaded the vesicles with genetic molecules," said Szostak. The researchers conducted the same competition tests using vesicles loaded with the basic molecular building blocks of genetic material, called nucleotides. Next, they used RNA segments, and finally a large, natural RNA molecule. In all cases, they saw that the vesicles swollen with genetic material grew, while those with no genetic material shrank.
It is important to note, said Szostak, the concentrations of genetic material that his group used were comparable to those found in living cells.
"In contrast to the earlier idea that Darwinian competition at the cellular level had to wait until the evolution of lipid-synthesizing ribozymes or structural RNAs, our results show that all you would need is to have the RNA replicating," said Szostak. "The cells that had RNA that replicated better -- and ended up with more RNA inside -- would grow faster. So, there is a direct coupling between how well the RNA replicates and how quickly the cell can grow. It's just based on a physical principle and would emerge spontaneously," he said.
According to Szostak, the next step in the research will depend on another major effort under way in his laboratory to create artificial, replicating RNA molecules.
"If we can get self-replicating RNAs, then we can put them into these simple membrane compartments and hope to actually see this competitive process of growth that we are hypothesizing," he said.
This is pretty definitive proof that life is nothing more than a completely natural event, and probably widespread throughout the universe.
You are right and God created every bit of it.
"You are right and God created every bit of it."
Or in this case, scientists with some chemicals in a lab.
Or in this case, scientists with some chemicals in a lab.
And the scientists came from where ?
I think that you’re smart enough to differentiate between disagreement engaged through reason on these boards and one or two liner name calling posts.
I missed an earlier dork reference, but I take you at your word.
They most likely came from a natural version of what they are doing in the lab. Just groupings of chemicals.
If you go back more, you'll get into string theory which is beginning to explain a natural and completely spontaneous universe creation too.
Fair enough. I think that no evolutionist has a theory that’s any more solid than creationism of what came before the big bang.
If you go back more, you'll get into string theory which is beginning to explain a natural and completely spontaneous universe creation too.
I don't have to go back any more than
Gen 1.1
And when Tweedle Beetles battle with their paddles in a bubble in a bottle,
And the bottle's on a poodle, and the poodle's eating noodles,
It's a Tweedle Beetle Noodle Poodle Bubble Bottle Paddle Battle.
“In science, the word "hypothesis" conveys the tentativeness inherent in the common use of the word "theory.' A hypothesis is a testable statement about the natural world. Through experiment and observation, hypotheses can be supported or rejected. At the earliest level of understanding, hypotheses can be used to construct more complex inferences and explanations. Like "theory," the word "fact" has a different meaning in science than it does in common usage. A scientific fact is an observation that has been confirmed over and over. However, observations are gathered by our senses, which can never be trusted entirely. Observations also can change with better technologies or with better ways of looking at data. For example, it was held as a scientific fact for many years that human cells have 24 pairs of chromosomes, until improved techniques of microscopy revealed that they actually have 23. Ironically, facts in science often are more susceptible to change than theories, which is one reason why the word "fact" is not much used in science.
Finally, "laws" in science are typically descriptions of how the physical world behaves under certain circumstances. For example, the laws of motion describe how objects move when subjected to certain forces. These laws can be very useful in supporting hypotheses and theories, but like all elements of science they can be altered with new information and observations.
Those who oppose the teaching of evolution often say that evolution should be taught as a "theory, not as a fact." This statement confuses the common use of these words with the scientific use. In science, theories do not turn into facts through the accumulation of evidence. Rather, theories are the end points of science. They are understandings that develop from extensive observation, experimentation, and creative reflection. They incorporate a large body of scientific facts, laws, tested hypotheses, and logical inferences. In this sense, evolution is one of the strongest and most useful scientific theories we have."
Same BS as the article
ROTFLMAO! 87 seconds! (including the time it took to post back to me) You did not even bother to read what I wrote, yet you call it BS.
"I missed an earlier dork reference, but I take you at your word."
It was in the post directly above mine, the one to which I was responding.
But in any case, had I added the " ;) " my intent would have been clearer.
Friday Church News Notes, September 3, 2004 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, fbns@wayoflife.org,
http://www.wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) -
Modern science has made much progress, but we still know very little about the world around us; scientists cannot create life and do not even understand what life is; and yet many scientists tend to think that they have truly "arrived."
When Hurricane Charley was heading toward the Florida coast earlier this month, I was in Virginia on a preaching engagement and I heard a meteorologist state that they were quite confident of where the hurricane would make landfall because of the recent perfection of the weather models.
The next day Charley took a sharp turn eastward and made landfall 100 miles south of the predicted place, making havoc of the evacuation plans. At the end of the day, all the meteorologists could say with certainly until the very last moment was that the hurricane was going to hit somewhere on the Gulf coast of Florida, and anyone observing the storm in its last few days could have made the same prediction. Recently the Sunday Telegraph in London investigated the reliability of weather forecasts more than one day in advance and found that they are so vague and unreliable as to be virtually useless.
"For the five locations that were studied -- London, Belfast, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Norwich -- the worst forecasts turned out to be those predicting rain, which proved correct barely 50 per cent of the time, a success rate equivalent to flipping a coin" ("Now here's the weather forecast; we haven't got a clue," London Telegraph, Aug. 29, 2004). When modern science can't even predict the weather a couple of days in advance, it is foolish to think that it can figure out the origin of the universe. I will make my stand with the Bible; which has never been wrong in any prediction!
BTW I took a speeding reading course in third grade.
Ever hear of cosmology, relativity, quatum mechanics, etc? Shall we march backwards to the 12th century and just say "God did it"?
I see now, you’re not the one who lost it.
All great science has its genesis in alcohol, as does philosophy, psychology, religion ...
There was no compelling. It was pure mechanics. Material was siphoned from weaker protocells to ease the tension of stronger protocells. The latter did not seek out the former, but when the two protocells bumped into one another, a natural chemical action took place.
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