The Circle of Genomes

Biology has increasingly become an information science, and the complexity of information is on the rise. Ten years ago, the genome sequence of the bacterium Haemophilus influenzae, sequenced by TIGR, led by Craig Venter, in a then audacious move, cut sequencing costs by half (50 cents a base) and developed technology and drove the project along with computational biologists. It took 13 months for the sequencing alone and 30 hours for the TIGR Assembler software to assemble the 24,000 DNA fragments . Another genome, that of Mycoplasma genitalium, the smallest bacterial genome, was produced in 8 months. These were remarkable achievements of that time, and gave impetus to the thought process of completing the human genome itself, which was eventually published in the year 2001, in a dramatic neck to neck race between the public consortium and Celera Genomics. (publications in Nature and Science)I remember very well the feverish excitement among scientists om the subject of the human genome and its implications. It was everywhere, it was inescapable, and it was breathtaking. How Celera was going to charge for access to the annotation of the genome was widely publicized and how the talk of every search which a researcher made in their database would be monitored for scientific leverage was a concern that was shared by the cautious. But its hard to say how much of this was well founded and how much leverage ( if any ) did Celera's scientists gain. An explosion of public and private databases on the human genome has flourished since then, and the boom that was loud and resounding then has somewhat fizzled out, as increasingly we found that the sequence was not the answer to all questions. This however, does not lessen the importance of the sequence, which is a prime example of one the most invaluable biological resources produced by a world wide collaborative scientific effort. It has taught us many things, importantly, an appreciation of scale in biology.However, sequencing efforts are getting better, to put it mildly. A latest publication in Nature demonstrates a brand new method of sequencing - pyrosequencing. The developers, in order to show the effectiveness of the approach, chose the historic Mycoplasma genitalium (originally sequenced by TIGR in 8 months) and finished the sequencing (96% coverage, 99.96% accuracy) in a single 4 hour run. Breathtaking you say ? And what is the next goal ? What do you think ?

Ghost Footprints

A foot and an ancient footprint. Photo from the Mexican Footprints media section

Currently it is believed that humans entered the Americas only about 11,500 years ago. Much research has gone into the topic. And the book The Journey of Man: A Genetic Odyssey by Spencer Wells, discusses and explains the varied human migrations that have occurred in human history. Now, a foot of contention has arisen (as happens now and again in research. A study of an interesting set of footprint like ancient impressions Pueblo, Mexico, has hinted that these may be nearly 40,000 years old. Not to be outdone in any way, another team has dismissed 40,000 years as a date and purports 1.3 million years as the more reasonable one. But the contention is, if they are really that old footprints, what explanations do we have for all the other research we have done ? But even more, are they really footprints ? Can you tell ?

Look here for the complete gallery

Ancient Wings

Scientists have believed that Archaeopteryx (“Ancient Wing”) had a “perching toe” (just like birds), which helped them to grasp branches of trees. However, a new extremely well preserved fossil of Archaeopteryx from Thermopolis, has been found to have no perching toe at all. This limestone encased fossil also has one of the best-preserved skulls of all specimens ever found. However, it is the feet that are the centre of attraction as all previous fossils had rather shriveled up feet, but not this Thermopolis specimen. The feet, have a thumb-like extension from the side of the foot rather than from the back. So the ancient winged fellers might not have been exactly swooping from the skies on their meals, but rather furtively scouring around and over bushes in pursuit of their natural motives.

Crazy Chameleons

They are certainly one of the most captivating creatures to look at. Can change color at will, and become pretty much invisible (without the invisibility cloak from Harry Potter). The transformation is eerie indeed. There’s more, they can move both eyes independently of each other. It has a long sticky tongue,that shoots out within a split second to grab the unsuspecting prey. It hides in the trees and leaves and waits patiently for the prey to get within shooting length, which is about twice the length of its body

Largest frogs

The Goliath Frog

by far the largest frog on the planet. Can measure upto 1 foot! that's right, nearly 12 inches... and if you measure the legs as well, the combined length of the entire animal may be upto (or even) more than 2 feet!. A perfect nightmare for frogophobiacs! You might never see one actually in your life time though, unless you decide a trip to coastal Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea in western Africa.

Click here for some images

Shark stuff

Two-thirds of a shark's brain is dedicated to smell, amazing! isn't it ? In addition to the smell stuff, they have these really cool electrical vibration detectors called the "ampullae of Lorenzini", which help the shark detect electrical and magnetic fields generated by the prey, and the ocean floor. Apparently it also helps in navigation.

Click here to read about Nicole (Kidman), the great white shark who is on record for the longest recorded journey in human or shark history...

what a terribly long way to swim...

Random Biology

Biology is an exciting study. There is an infinite amount of diversity of life on this planet. One can never run out of surprises. I'll try to share some interesting bits of information on this blog. You may find them interesting. Please feel free to post if you have interesting tidbits that you would like to share.