![]() ![]() As soon as he said his name she replied, "Oh yes, Thing 1 has mentioned you before". Somehow, in that short time, my former mother-in-law searched out Picklejar and introduced herself. I swear, I only stepped out of the room for, like, 5 minutes. My ex hasn't as yet discussed my impending nuptials with his family, so we pretty much just tried to avoid that side of the room so that we wouldn't ruin my son's big day. It's pretty messed up when my crazy parents and the Sister missionaries are Picklejar's comfort zone. Oh yeah, let's just get my formers in the same room as my future and all just spend a few hours hanging out together. The reeeeeeeally awkward part came from Thing 2 wanting my future dh (I shall hereafter call him Picklejar) to be at his special day too. It was really, truly awesome to have them both be a part of his day. My dad baptized him, which was kind of a big deal since my dad wasn't a member when I was baptized, and my ex's father confirmed him. ![]() His dad couldn't be there but he decided to have both grandfathers be a part of his special day. You could feel the spirit and belief in the room when he made the choice to be baptized. But now, especially since he decided he's thrilled to have a stepdad in his future, he's returned to my happy, calm, exceptionally aware kid. I'm not kidding, he once tried to run out in traffic. Hard to believe that a year ago I had a kid who felt like he wanted to die because his world was falling apart. Lateral Transfer of Genes from Fungi Underlies Carotenoid Production in Aphids Science, 328 (5978), 624-627 DOI: 10.1126/science.My middle kid (Thing 2) got baptized this last weekend. Update II: this post has been submitted for the NESCent travel award for the Science Online 2011 conference. However, I have the sneaking suspicion that as we sequence more animal, plant, fungal and other genomes of multicellular organism, we would find more cases of “large-leap” HGT of functional genes happening: we just don’t have enough genomes yet to appreciate the frequency of these occurrences! Still, this is the first time a case of gene transfer that is so clear between two different kingdoms. Credit: Zina Deretsky, National Science FoundationĪs an aside, many of our pseudogenes and other contents of “junk DNA” are thought to have been acquired by horizontal gene transfer. DNA transfer from fungus to animal is unprecedented." (text taken from the NSF announcement). The precise way the DNA transfer occurred is not yet understood however patterns within the DNA conclusively show a link to a fungus. The rest of us must forage for foods such as carrots, containing carotenoids. However this aphid is the only organism in the Animal Kingdom so far to have been reported capable of producing it internally. All animals need carotenoids for body functions as important as eyesight. This DNA now allows the aphid to generate its own carotenoid molecules. "Long ago, an ancestor to today's pea aphid somehow internalized a large important chunk of DNA from a fungus. (I’ll refrain from comments about Auntie Mae.) So in the case of aphids, as opposed to puffins and flamingo, the selective pressure is that of predation, not of mating. So there is an evolutionary aspect here: the carotenoid genes play a role in the predator-driven selection of aphids. Horizontal gene transfer is not unheard-of in animals, and is actually quite common in plants (yeah, fungi are not plants, I know that), but this is the first time someone has shown a jump from fungi to animals, and that the trait that this gene conveys - color - became embedded and functional in the genome.Īphid color is important: red aphids get picked easily by predators off green plants, and vice-versa. The question they naturally asked is “where did those genes come from”? The animal kingdom does not contain genes for making carotenoids, so how come aphids have them? Indeed, when they looked for the most similar genes to the aphid carotenoid synthesizing genes they found that they came from fungi, which means they somehow jumped between fungi and aphids, in a process known as horizontal gene transfer. When looking at the genomes of the aphids, Moran and Jarvik found that they contained genes for synthesizing carotenoids: this is the first time carotenoid synthesizing genes are found in animals. Aphids feed on sap, and sap does not contain carotenoids. ![]() It was not very clear though how the aphids got their color. ![]() The pea aphid is known for having two different colors: green and red. Nancy Moran and Tyler Jarvik form the University of Arizona looked at the recently sequenced genome of the pea aphid. Not so pretty.Īn article published today in Science shows the first case of animals synthesizing carotenoids. ![]()
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