Posted on 01/13/2006 7:25:46 AM PST by Michael_Michaelangelo
Just as a pocket watch requires a complex system of gears and springs to keep it ticking precisely, individual cells have a network of proteins and genes that maintain their own internal clock -- a 24-hour rhythm that, in humans, regulates metabolism, cell division, and hormone production, as well as the wake-sleep cycle. Studying this "circadian" rhythm in fruit flies, which have genes that are similar to our own, scientists have constructed a basic model of how the cellular timekeeper works. But now, a new report in this week's issue of the journal Science turns the old model on its head: By providing a glimpse into living cells, Rockefeller University researchers have uncovered a previously undetected clock inside the circadian clock. The scientists made the finding with a rarely used technique called FRET, which enabled them to follow circadian proteins over an extended period of time and watch the clock as it ticks away in a living cell.
[snip]
The movie allowed them to follow the interactions between Period and Timeless with a resolution never before possible. They discovered that, rather than randomly colliding, the two proteins bind together in the cytoplasm almost immediately and create what Young and Meyer refer to as an "interval timer." Then, six hours after coming together, the complexes rapidly break apart and the proteins move into the nucleus singly, all of them within minutes of each other. "Some switch is thrown at six hours that lets the complex explode. The proteins pop apart and roll into the nucleus," Young says. "Somehow, implanted within the system is a timer, formed by Period and Timeless, that counts off six hours. You have a clock within a clock." He notes that this precise timer shows how carefully orchestrated interactions between proteins really are.
(Excerpt) Read more at eurekalert.org ...
Further reading:
Natural Theology; or, Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity / by William Paley
Ping
ping
All molecular interactions within cells are interesting. The complexity, coordination, and beauty is awe inspiring.
If there is no God, then Nature does one hell of an imitation.
The article concludes: Young and Meyer, who's now a postdoctoral researcher at Columbia University, have yet to figure out exactly how the timer works, but its discovery opens up the door to a whole new suite of questions. "How does this interval timer tick? Is it made from additional proteins? Is this the only such timer in the circadian clock? Each of these questions are ahead of us," Young says. "A couple of years ago, we had identified lots of genes and had this sweeping picture of how circadian clocks work. But this indicates that there are much more formidable properties of the system that were overlooked."
All I can say is how awesome and marvelous the Lord God is.
FRET?
... So he turned to a technique invented in 1948, called fluorescence resonance energy transfer; FRET gauges interactions between proteins by fluorescently tagging them and measuring how they react to different wavelengths of light. But although the technique can provide useful information, it's so complicated that researchers rarely use it. And no one had ever thought to use it to follow proteins in a single cell for an extended period of time...
Happy Birtday...
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"Somehow, implanted within the system is a timer. . .that counts off six hours. . . .This precise timer shows how carefully orchestrated interactions between proteins really are.
It's a FESTIVUS Miracle!
It's amazing what random, non-intelligent, lack-of-design is capable of accomplishing.
Cool! I wonder who designed that?
No one designed it. It just happened. There is no designer and no beginning. The evolutionists will explain it in greater detail. :)
Why, I'll bet there's a team of tiny angels that push the proteins around just so.
Much simpler. Any grade-school dropout could master the subject in a few moments. And many claim to have done so.
Thanks!
It's my birtday... you know!
Happy Birthday, Dasher!
"Why, I'll bet there's a team of tiny angels that push the proteins around just so."
But can you prove it?
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