Nice Comment

Comment by Chris on March 28, 2019 at 5:21am

Might be of interest to some.

Colder Than Ice: Researchers Discover How Microbes Survive in Subfr...

Most microbial researchers grow their microbes in petri-dishes to study how they grow and how they respond to damaging conditions. But researchers in Louisiana State University’s Department of Biological Sciences are doing something almost unheard of: studying microbes under freezing conditions to understand how organisms could survive for hundreds of thousands of years in deep [...]

Most microbial researchers grow their microbes in petri-dishes to study how they grow and how they respond to damaging conditions. But researchers in Louisiana State University’s Department of Biological Sciences are doing something almost unheard of: studying microbes under freezing conditions to understand how organisms could survive for hundreds of thousands of years in deep Antarctic permafrost, or perhaps even buried in ice on Mars.

“I could take you down the hallway into a common room we have, full of freezers,” said Brent Christner, an associate professor in LSU’s Department of Biological Sciences and Antarctic microbe explorer extraordinaire, leaning excitedly over his desk as he shows me microscope images of cells encased in ice. “And in those freezers are cells and tissues. We put them there, because that is actually a way to preserve them.”

Christner’s lab keeps thousands of different strains of microbes stored at -80 degrees Celsius. These microbes, he explains, are actually quite happily revived if taken out of the freezer and placed in nutrient-rich media. “But what if those freezers could run for a million years?” Christner asked. “We’d actually expect a fraction of them to die off every year, because they are made up of molecules that, even if frozen, are subject to decay.”

Christner and colleagues at LSU, postdoctoral researcher Markus Dieser and Mary Lou Applewhite Professor of biology John Battista, recently had a paper on DNA repair mechanisms in frozen microbes accepted in the journal of Applied and Environmental Microbiology. To understand how microbes survive in frozen conditions, Christner and colleagues focused on DNA, the hereditary molecule that encodes the genetic instructions used in the development and function of living organisms from humans to microbes. Microbe DNA is typically millions of base pairs, or units, long, often arranged into a single circular structure that encodes thousands of genes.

More in the above link.

For fun a song link.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YohsEI1PTSc

Comment by Chris on March 28, 2019 at 5:16am

Another commonly heald  understanding is that Intiuits are able to  maintain heat, not ontly because of their clothing, but also because  of adaptation that includes body and limb size.

Comment by Chris on March 28, 2019 at 2:39am

You might be interestd in  the following:

about Lunne Cox.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynne_Cox

Comment by Stephen on March 24, 2019 at 6:45pm

Molecular mechanism and history of non-sense to sense evolution of antifreeze glycoprotein gene in northern gadids

Significance
The diverse antifreeze proteins enabling the survival of different polar fishes in freezing seas offer unparalleled vistas into the breadth of genetic sources and mechanisms that produce crucial new functions. Although most new genes evolved from preexisting genic ancestors, some are deemed to have arisen from noncoding DNA. However, the pertinent mechanisms, functions, and selective forces remain uncertain. Our paper presents clear evidence that the antifreeze glycoprotein gene of the northern codfish originated from a noncoding region. We further describe the detailed mechanism of its evolutionary transformation into a full-fledged crucial life-saving gene. This paper is a concrete dissection of the process of a de novo gene birth that has conferred a vital adaptive function directly linked to natural selection.

Read more =  https://www.pnas.org/content/116/10/4400

Comment by Mrs.B on February 28, 2019 at 7:52pm

Excellent graphic.

Comment by Stephen on February 28, 2019 at 6:58pm

Comment by Mrs.B on February 16, 2019 at 2:00pm

Right on point.

Comment by Stephen on February 16, 2019 at 9:43am

Comment by Doone on February 15, 2019 at 3:21pm

More

On of my favorite lines Charles Darwin ever wrote, from Descent of Man, 1871: #DarwinDay #histsci

Comment by Mrs.B on February 12, 2019 at 2:51pm

Yeah, I should have specified, rather than humanity in general.

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