Biologists to actually create life

[quexos]

Amazing isn't it ? On the other hand, life being some kind of complex chemical interaction between elements, this was bound to happen sooner or later.

http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2...npu=1&mbid=yhp

A team of biologists and chemists is closing in on bringing non-living matter to life.

It's not as Frankensteinian as it sounds. Instead, a lab led by Jack Szostak, a molecular biologist at Harvard Medical School, is building simple cell models that can almost be called life.

Szostak's protocells are built from fatty molecules that can trap bits of nucleic acids that contain the source code for replication. Combined with a process that harnesses external energy from the sun or chemical reactions, they could form a self-replicating, evolving system that satisfies the conditions of life, but isn't anything like life on earth now, but might represent life as it began or could exist elsewhere in the universe.

[Chris60119]

I saw that on yahoo to. I think it's pretty cool. I wonder what it would turn into if they let it grow for years.

[TheJesus]

Originally Posted by frettless5

I saw that on yahoo to. I think it's pretty cool. I wonder what it would turn into if they let it grow for years.

Probably something like this...

[BLUNT]

Or this:


rosie-oterror.jpg

[dpomp]

Originally Posted by BLUNT

Or this:


Attachment 3451

LMFAO

[jamclaur]

or something as disgusting as this...

[jamclaur]

Great find though... I'd be interested in hearing where this work is in a year from now.

[quexos]

Originally Posted by jamclaur

Great find though... I'd be interested in hearing where this work is in a year from now.

Indeed. That reminds me of a discovery made a few years ago in Siberia. They found and took away a fully preserved mammoth. I saw the documentary and it was amazing. There was a lot of implications for science but the biggest was that eventually with it's DNA fully preserved it could be actually cloned meaning that mammoths gone for over 20.000 years could be reborn, but then I never heard about that thing again.

[jamclaur]

Originally Posted by quexos

Indeed. That reminds me of a discovery made a few years ago in Siberia. They found and took away a fully preserved mammoth. I saw the documentary and it was amazing. There was a lot of implications for science but the biggest was that eventually with it's DNA fully preserved it could be actually cloned meaning that mammoths gone for over 20.000 years could be reborn, but then I never heard about that thing again.

That's the downside to science. Things that are HUGE news can be blips of memory in a few days since things are ever changing.

It'd be interesting if they took this life and set it loose on say, Venus and attempted to get it to grow there naturally... We all know there's no life or eco-system there so the experiment wouldn't really put anything in harms way... Unless it rapidly evolved and started an intergalactic war with us.

[Forrestandjen07]

there should allways be a warning on threads that are showing rossie pix

[toef]

Originally Posted by quexos

Indeed. That reminds me of a discovery made a few years ago in Siberia. They found and took away a fully preserved mammoth. I saw the documentary and it was amazing. There was a lot of implications for science but the biggest was that eventually with it's DNA fully preserved it could be actually cloned meaning that mammoths gone for over 20.000 years could be reborn, but then I never heard about that thing again.

I think I heard about that too.

It'd never be a full wooly mammoth, but it'd come close. I think the idea was to mix the DNA with an elephant egg, so the result would be half-mammoth/half-elephant. After breeding the offspring with another elephant, and rinsing and repeating that formula, the 5th generation would be about 97% mammoth.

But like you, I never heard about it again.