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 ...
Evolution is not atheism. Nor is chemistry, astronomy, etc. They're science. And I don't "head up" anything. I maintain the ping list. Also, as RadioAstronomer points out, I have the honor to be the principal spokesman for the Grand Master of Darwin Central.
The Black cloud by Fred Hoyle is about an intelligent nebula that uses RF. People hurt it inadvertently by using radio, and it reflexively reacts....
Once communication is established, it reveals, among other things, that Steady-State theory is correct.
Excerpt quoted on the site I linked to (Cloud "talking"):
[I]t is most unusual to find animals with technical skills inhabiting planets, which are in the nature of extreme outposts of life... Living on the surface of a solid body, you are exposed to a strong gravitational force. This greatly limits the size to which your animals can grow and hence limits the scope of your neurological activity. It forces you to possess muscular structures to promote movements, and ... to carry protective armour ... [Y]our very largest animals have been mostly bone and muscle with very little brain... By and large, one only expects intelligent life to exist in a diffuse gaseous medium... The second unfavourable factor is your extreme lack of basic chemical foods. For the building of chemical foods on a large scale starlight is necessary. Your planet, however, absorbs only a very minute fraction of the light from the Sun. At the moment, I myself am building basic chemicals at about 10,000,000,000 times the rate at which building is occurring on the whole ... surface of your planet.
Dragons Egg by Robert Forward has alien life on a neutron star. They naturally use X- and Gamma- rays. The humans think the aliens are technically advanced when they detect X-ray laser beams.
In the story "A Meeting with Medusa" Arthur C. Clarke hints at Jovian life using radio communication naturally.
Finally, James P. Hogan's Code of the Lifemaker is about evolution in a population of robots.
From the link above:
That was also a time when the Creationism-Evolution controversy was figuring prominently in the news. The two issues were not entirely separate but shared a certain degree of commonality in views concerning the nature of life, thought, and so on. A race of intelligent machines might find itself debating not only the possibility of "artificial" intelligence, but also the question of its own origins and the existence of non-machine-based life. After all, if the only systems observed to exist that possess the complexity needed to support life and intelligence are machines, then what made the first machine? This led to the notion of a story about a world inhabited by a naturally evolving machine biosphere
PS Is there an SF ping list/fan club here on FR? I believe VadeRetro has written some, and RadioAstronomer is a fan.
So cool! I have read all of those.
Thanks for post. :-)
thanks, hadn't thought of that.
Why's that? There are lots of reactions that absorb/emit light.
I have many questions that are not answered in the paper referred to. For instance, are the researchers sure the tagging itself does not influence these "clocks"?
I'm going to look into this further.
Here's the news release from Rockefeller University: New research shows how proteins make biological clock tick.
Selection at work!
But what percentage of them claim to be CHRISTIAN?
Romans 5:12-21
12. Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned--
13. for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account when there is no law.
14. Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the one to come.
15. But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!
16. Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification.
17. For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.
18. Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men.
19. For just as through the disobedience of the one man, the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.
20. The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more,
21. so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Isn't imagination wonderful!
Sorry, your understanding of the Bible and of the theory of evolution seems to limit your ability to understand them both.
I do not agree that you are qualified to tell professed Christians belonging to any Christian Church that they are not, in fact, Christians.
No, it's an example of nonlinearity and feedback in chemical kinetics. This paper.doc outlines the relevant features of the process with a few examples in chemical systems.
This timer is required to separate wake period activities and function from regeneration perios and function. The 2 can't go one at the same time, because the machinery used in both periods is the same. The machine is either generating consumables, or using them.
Why not ask the "God designed it" folks on this thread what need there was for God to insert an independent and redundant timer? Does your skepticism only run in one direction?
In any case, there are plenty of good reasons for organisms to have internal timers which don't rely on light triggers, for example so that the organism will still "wake up" if in a shaded area blocked from light, or so that it can anticipate dawn or dusk (so that it can be out and ready to catch prey that arrive at the crack of dawn, etc.)
and how could it have happened upon this rather complex one that has nothing to do with light in response to light?
By selection. Processes which were linked to chemical cycles which happened to have cycle times which were close to the daily cycle (or an even fraction of it, like six hours) would be selected for.
Why have a circadian rhythm independent of the day/night cycle?
One answer off the top of my head is that there is definite survival value in getting up before your predators (or prey) do.
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