Multicellular Life Evolves in Laboratory

Neapolitan · 01-20-2012, 11:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Janszoon

What do you mean by "evolution outside of science"?

I guess what I mean is when two scientist are in a lab doing a study of something scientific, or doing an experiment for the sake of science, the mention of "evolution" in a conversation is quite mundane and non-eventful, but say two non-sceintist are conversing about science the mere mention of "evolution" outside of scientific world that dialogue can spiral out of control into an heated argument. That's what I want to avoid.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tore

Organisms' DNA mutates. Of course the genetic makeup of the yeast would change over time, no matter what you did with it. We know this from a wealth of studies already. Science is way past that point and it's about time the general populace catches up.

And right now I feel like you're implying the general populace is me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tore

The interesting thing here is not actually that stuff evolves. Micro organisms (and life in general) evolve in the labs and elsewhere and that's nothing new. The interesting thing here is the evolution of the multicellular trait. Many have thought it a very difficult trait to achieve, but this scientist and his study shows how quickly it can happen in yeast and that can tell us something about how the trait first appeared in other lineages.

I think the evolving part is just as interesting as in the result of multi-cellularity.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tore

I find it a bit difficult to respond to you because I'm not sure we're on the same page. For example, I don't know to what extent you understand evolution. Perhaps you believe genetic mutations are very rare?

Well I wasn't excited too much about the experiment because they seem to rig it for the desire result, not because I do or don't believe in the frequency that mutations occur.

I guess the page I was coming from was like: Was multi-cellularity already a forgotten part of this organanism pre-historic past? Was there some environmental change that forced this multi-cell yeast of the past to evolved in singlular cellularity of today. But still even after the evolutionary step it kept those multi-cellular codes in it's DNA but they remained dormant, it never reach multi-cellularity form because whatever environment that organonsim once live no longer exist, and in the new environment singular-cellularity was more advantageous for survival. Then along came a scientist and he did an experiment by shaking vials, in reality he didn't forced evolution on the yeast but unwittingly unlocked a pre-existing code that was already there - the multi-cellularity code. I think that is more my point than the validity of evolution or how much I know about evolution.

Quote:

Originally Posted by duga

Yeah, I'm getting the impression he doesn't quite understand. Neapolitan, what is your understanding of what is going on?

That's the whole problem I don't really trust the procedure - not that that I lack the understanding of what is going on with the experiment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by duga

If they were to move the multi-cellular yeast to a different environment, surely it would die. It only has an advantage in the environment they "evolved" it in.

Well it depends - they might die out. I wouldn't rule that out entirely, statistically speaking there could be some environment somewhere on this vast planet where multi-cellular brewer's yeast could survive in - in a hypothetical scenario - there could an environment that could be similar to that of the experiment.