Posted on 08/03/2019 10:48:05 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
RNA -- the short-lived transcripts of genes -- from the "Tumat puppy", a wolf of the Pleistocene era has been isolated, and its sequence analyzed in a new study by Oliver Smith of the University of Copenhagen and colleagues publishing on July 30 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology. The results establish the possibility of examining a range of RNA transcripts from ancient organisms, a possibility previously thought to be extremely unlikely because of the short lifespan of RNA.
DNA, which encodes the "hard copy" of genes, is known to survive for thousands of years under favourable conditions. But RNA -- the short-lived working copy of a gene, which is transcribed from DNA in the cell and forms the instructions for making proteins -- is rapidly broken down in living tissue by a suite of recycling enzymes. That instability typically continues after death, and because of that, researchers have generally assumed that the likelihood of finding intact an ancient cell's complement of RNA -- its transcriptome -- was vanishingly small. But there have been a few exceptions, mostly in plants, which led the authors to ask whether there might be ancient animal transcriptomes well-preserved enough to be sequenced.
They isolated and analyzed RNA from liver tissue of a 14,300-year-old canid, possibly a wolf or partially domesticated wolf-like creature, that had been preserved in Siberian permafrost until its discovery, as well as tissue from two 19th- and 20th-century wolves for comparison. Using a variety of transcriptomic techniques and quality control measures, the team showed that the RNA sequenced from the Pleistocene-era canid was truly representative of the animal's RNA, with many liver-specific transcripts that matched more modern samples from both wolves and dogs.
(Excerpt) Read more at eurekalert.org ...
Some people will only get one shot though.
Your turn to make a horrible pun, taiga, you’re it!
I canine understand why you’d say that...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/3769218/posts?page=34#34
I canine understand why you’d say that...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/3769218/posts?page=34#34
I concur but I’m out of ideas.
Whats heavier, a gram of water, or a gram of butane?
African or European?
That's an old favorite. I hear they *pound*ed it out in just six weeks, working on location in Yugoslavia.
That's an old favorite. I hear they *pound*ed it out in just six weeks, working on location in Yugoslavia.
I think Plato discussed all this in the Phaedo.
That’s paw-sible.
It's the leash of our worries, though.
Wonderful!
LOL! Love it.
Yeah, you don’t want to take it that fur.
Sometimes I kennel help it.
I wonder howl long it’ll be before the clone it?
Water or butane.
I find your first answer hard to swallow.
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