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USC Scientists Uncover Secrets Of Feather Formation
University Of Southern California / ScienceDaily.com ^ | 10/31/2002 | Cheng-Ming Chuong, et al

Posted on 10/31/2002 6:51:38 AM PST by forsnax5

Los Angeles, Oct. 30, 2002 - Scientists from the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California have, for the first time, shown experimentally the steps in the origin and development of feathers, using the techniques of molecular biology. Their findings will have implications for the study of the morphogenesis of various epithelial organs-from hairs to lung tissue to mammary glands-and is already shedding light on the controversy over the evolution of dinosaur scales into avian feathers.

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: animalhusbandry; crevolist; dietandcuisine; dinosaurevolution; godsgravesglyphs; helixmakemineadouble
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To: AndrewC
You lost me. Are you claiming that the whole of evolutionary theory (or at least the claim that birds evolved from reptiles) should properly stand or fall on the question of whether rachides or barbs develop (and developed) first? That is an odd and dubious perspective, but it seems the only one under which your posts make sense.
181 posted on 11/03/2002 11:31:59 AM PST by Stultis
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To: Nebullis
Once again, the creationists are tripping over themselves to tear down strawmen of their own ignorant making. Just for example, ontogeny does not recapitulate phylogeny in the Haeckle sense, therefore this study is meaningless.

The author himself admits that "They also have shown that the evolution from scale to feather most likely followed a path in which the barbs form first and then fuse to produce a rachis – rather than a rachis forming first and then being sculpted into barbs and barbules." Note the underlined words 'most likely'. In other words the experiment gives no such proof. They changed feather formation by altering the expression of three different genes. Each one produced a different effect. There was no attempt at finding out exactly what sequence the chicken's developmental program follows in producing feathers. Therefore such a conclusion is totally unsupported by this experient. It also should be noted that it is the writer of the article which is claimint this conclusion, he is not quoting those who did the experiment.

And, as they didn't use this newly discovered developmental pathway to produce feathers in an unrelated organism (the elephant?) they didn't discover a developmental pathway.

How can one speak of a pathway when we are talking about three different genes being involved in the production of feathers? How can one speak of a pathway when these genes are used in different species to produce different cells and even in the same species to produce different cells at different times in the developmental program. You are talking total nonsense as I have clearly shown in Post# 66 and Post# 81 which you are clearly trying to dismiss without showing a single piece of evidence to refute them. As the article in Post# 31 " Among others, three genes in particular" There are many more genes involved in this, but the author dishonestly dismisses them as needed in feather formation. What these genes are, whether they are particular to birds or not, is not mentioned in the article. They are needed though for feather formation and their absence from the article and from the experiment invalidates the conclusions made in the article. In fact, it invalidates the whole experiment since clearly the 'scientists' were out to prove a pre-determined point, not to really find out what was involved in producing feathers in an animal that did not have feathers.

Further, because they don't accept evolution, they don't accept that the evidence is consistent with evolution. (How's that for logic?) On and on they blather. If they could only hear themselves.

It is you who is blathering. You can show nothing in the article or anywhere else supporting the conclusions of this experiment.

This article very neatly lays out evidence for a ontogenic pathway of modern feathers, elucidating the main gene players involved.

Nonsense. Ontogeny refers to the developmental program by which one cell creates millions or billions of other cells in exactly the right place and of exactly the right kind. The experiment dealt with a grown chicken, it did not even look at how and when the different genes that form the feathers are activated during development.

Very nice work. And we already know that ontogeny recapitulates developmental pathways so this study has something important to say about the evolution of feathers. This work is concise, clean, and significant for evolution and development.

What pathways do you keep talking about? Are they like highways, expressways, parkways? You are talking garbage. Ontogeny means development so all you are stating is 1=1. What you are throwing in is the word 'pathway'. There are no pathways in development. There are numerous genes involved and those genes are turned on and off at different stages of development. Those genes interact with others in complicated ways, acting with different ones at different stages. There are no pathways. All there is is a very specific, very involved program which controls the actions of a multitued of genes at each particular stage.

182 posted on 11/03/2002 12:16:59 PM PST by gore3000
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To: VadeRetro
I want to rant on and on at the "You can't make me see or understand" nonsense,

You certainly do not wish to see and do not wish to understand that the article is total nonsense. That you have partners in crime who can only rant against what the anti-evolutionists have to say shows that you neither understand the article nor the questions it raises.

183 posted on 11/03/2002 12:21:31 PM PST by gore3000
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To: js1138
As for fractals, I suspect Wolframs's cellular automata are even simpler,

It is interesting that while evolutionists rant against 'intelligent design' they are trying to use the most obvious example of intelligent design - programming - to support their theory. Problem you folk have is that not a single rock has ever written an algorithm.

184 posted on 11/03/2002 12:25:18 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Stultis
You lost me. Are you claiming that the whole of evolutionary theory (or at least the claim that birds evolved from reptiles) should properly stand or fall on the question of whether rachides or barbs develop (and developed) first? That is an odd and dubious perspective, but it seems the only one under which your posts make sense.

Ok in sequence

  1. is already shedding light on the controversy over the evolution of dinosaur scales into avian feathers.
  2. The standing hypothesis among many paleontologists has long been that the scales on dinosaurs must have lengthened into rachides that then became notched to form barbs and barbules. But there has been no real molecular evidence to either back up or refute that argument. Until now.
  3. It's all a lie, I tell you!  I have personally disproven evolution, chemistry, astronomy, geology and all other false atheistic, Nazi communist one-world government scientific slime!

    [/LBB mode]

  4. You beat me to it. But I can't help wondering ... what must it be like, trying desperately to stamp out all new discoveries, all over the world? Gotta be frustrating.
  5. In any case, this article gives more evidence that the Darwininian viewpoint is unfalsifiable. No matter what evidence is found, it will be used as an "I told you so" at some point even though the record will show otherwise.
Seems clear to me. Paleos made a claim about the evolution of dino feathers. This study, which in my estimation doesn't even directly tie into that question, is linked to that claim in the article, items 1 and 2. The study, if allowed to be linked to the claim, does not substantiate it. Yet the very first posts by Darwinians shows them to be Darwininians. They make the invidious and insinuative charge noted in 3 and 4 above. I answered in number 5 by noting that the charge would have been made even if the experiment would have substantiated the claim. The experiment demonstrates how the manipulation of certain genes affects the development of feathers on modern chickens, all else is speculative. Nonetheless the Darwininians attacked when nothing had yet been stated about the experiment. I pointed that out. Clear now?
185 posted on 11/03/2002 12:30:25 PM PST by AndrewC
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To: VadeRetro
When shown that your theory is nonsense you always bring out a bunch of bones. Well, those bones do not prove anything. They raise more questions than they answer. Most of them are totally unclassified but what the heck, they make a nice picture don't they?

Well here's something a lot more real - some species for which evolution can in no way explain how their unique features could have descended from anything. They totally disprove the assumptions of evolutionists and are like the 'crazy aunt' which evolutionists want no one to see:

Top: Euglena, Hymenopimesis Wasp, Butterfly, Platypus
Bottom: Bat, Fugu, Cambrian species

186 posted on 11/03/2002 12:33:47 PM PST by gore3000
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To: AndrewC
You really didn't expect the Darwininians to admit anything did you?

Heck no! All they can do is filibuster the thread with irrelevant statements and vacuous assertions. They do not even understand the article and can only repeat 'well somebody says so so it must be true'. They are completely lame in the face of facts.

187 posted on 11/03/2002 12:37:03 PM PST by gore3000
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To: AndrewC
Had the experiment failed miserably to do anything it would not have made it out the door.

This experiment is a farce from the word go. It is shameful that public money should be wasted this way. The purposes of the three genes mentioned here are well known. The methods are nothing new, gene expression research is the most common biological research being done nowadays. It cannot be called developmental research because they were dealing with grown chickens not with chicken eggs. Chickens regrow feathers and all they showed is how some of the genes involved affect such growth. It should also be noted that these genes which are used in development also continue to be used throughout life. This shows the reuse of DNA code quite well and the marvel of DNA which keeps mixing and remixing different genes, proteins, and DNA at different times in order to perform the enormously complex functions needed for life.

188 posted on 11/03/2002 12:48:01 PM PST by gore3000
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To: VadeRetro
Neanderthals may have contributed to the human gene pool.

Science says otherwise. Three separate studies by three separate groups of scientists using three separate DNA specimens from three widely separate sites have determined otherwise. In addition, there are numerous examples of Neanderthals and humans living in close proximity with no mixed specimens found. So no, the above is garbage. As far as science goes they did not. It is only in the fantasies of evolutionists that such is a possibility.

189 posted on 11/03/2002 1:14:55 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Lysander
What came first, the chicken or the egg?

The question is, who laid the chicken!

190 posted on 11/03/2002 1:21:46 PM PST by Stallone
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To: Nebullis
Whether barbs or rachides formed first is not put forth as evidence of evolution.

What Andrew is saying is that evolutionists claim evolution is true regardless of whether an experiment confirms or denies the claims which had been made by evolutionists. Now this one claims to deny the claims about how feathers were formed by evolutionists. It only claims to do so because it really does not give proof ot it. Nevertheless, it shows that evolutionists go around making claims without ever having conducted any experiments to show those claims to be true or false. This is why evolution is pseudo-science. It just makes assumptions, it does not examine the evidence. That is why evolution is most comfortable with fossils. It is fertile ground for assumptions since hardly anything can be proven by them.

191 posted on 11/03/2002 1:23:32 PM PST by gore3000
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To: VadeRetro
Science and science education have to follow the evidence.

What evidence do you speak of? Humans breed humans, dogs breed dogs, cats breed cats. No one has ever seen anything else. It is you who has no evidence. We who oppose evolution have the evidence of billions of births which prove our statements, you have NOTHING.

192 posted on 11/03/2002 1:27:55 PM PST by gore3000
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To: AndrewC
I was gonna say "Cooked goose" .... but I like yours better.

The bird failed to duck in time, but it might yet be able to vote democratic this fall ...

After all, it's plane to see that it got a nice job by featherembedding with its union: Yeap, got right in there and "unioned" with the aircraft industry.
193 posted on 11/03/2002 1:29:32 PM PST by Robert A Cook PE
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To: Condorman
Coin of the realm placemarker
194 posted on 11/03/2002 2:23:43 PM PST by Condorman
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To: Stallone; AndrewC
"The question is, who laid the chicken!"

Tis plane to see - The bigger bird won. (The smaller bird isn't one.)

Two birds of a feather now fly together....

http://www.strangecosmos.com/view.asp?PicID=952

A truly smashing conclusion to an old story.

A photo with impact.

This photo only just nosed out the second place photograph above by two feet ...

It's impact was impressive: on the judges, and on the duck.

How should I say it? Maybe, "This bird got stuffed right after Christmas?"


195 posted on 11/03/2002 2:27:09 PM PST by Robert A Cook PE
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To: gore3000
In addition, there are numerous examples of Neanderthals and humans living in close proximity with no mixed specimens found.

At least two I remember offhand.

The robust features of the Skhul 5 male may indicate this early modern human had Neanderthals in the family, or his lineage may simply have retained primitive hominid traits also possessed by Neanderthals.
Neandertal and "modern" in West Asia.

The Last Neandertal.

Skhul V from Israel.

Lagar Velho from Portugal.

A nice overall summary.

196 posted on 11/03/2002 4:16:24 PM PST by VadeRetro
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To: AndrewC
Clear now?

No, not really but never mind.

197 posted on 11/03/2002 4:20:38 PM PST by Stultis
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To: gore3000
What the mtDNA differences mean and don't mean.
198 posted on 11/03/2002 4:21:42 PM PST by VadeRetro
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To: gore3000
There is no speculation here… Please understand that the trees don’t exist anymore, it’s all a matter of trimming the bushes. LOL!

Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with science changing it’s perspective when necessary – I have a problem with the little box they try to fit their toys into at the end of the day.

199 posted on 11/03/2002 5:41:56 PM PST by Heartlander
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To: VadeRetro
That skull looks like my uncle Louie.
200 posted on 11/03/2002 5:59:27 PM PST by PatrickHenry
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