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IMMORTAL GERMLINE. "At fertilization, the haploid egg and sperm genomes unite and produce an entirely new organism, and the everlasting germline cycle continues from one generation to the next. The germline thus escapes the mortality that all somatic cells of an organism ultimately confront." http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S009286740800202X View in LinkedIn

PAIRING. "We propose that RNA transcripts retained on the chromosome play an active role in recognition of homologous chromosomes for pairing." http://science.sciencemag.org/content/336/6082/732 View in LinkedIn

NON-CODING RNA. "Pairing and recombination of homologous chromosomes are essential for ensuring reductional segregation in meiosis. However, the mechanisms by which chromosomes recognize their homologous partners are poorly understood. Here, we report that the sme2 gene encodes a meiosis-specific noncoding RNA that mediates homologous recognition in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe." https://lnkd.in/gNZmnGV View in LinkedIn

SO ENDS this first of two weekends focused on the not-so-humble slime mold family. Victorians liked flea circuses. Slime molds would have been better under time lapse. The human time scale misses the details of lives living on different time scales. Next weekend we see the slime molds at their best. View in LinkedIn

ON SLIME MOLDS AND ANTS. “Path optimization in Physarum when traversing a maze is related to ant algorithmics. Ants in a formicary undertake coordinated behavior for the location and transportation of food.” https://ukacc.group.shef.ac.uk/proceedings/control2008/papers/p246.pdf View in LinkedIn

LEARNED BEHAVIOR. “If Physarum polycephalum is subjected to a regular series of shocks, it can learn the pattern and modify its behavior in anticipation of the next stimulus.” https://ukacc.group.shef.ac.uk/proceedings/control2008/papers/p246.pdf View in LinkedIn

LOSS OF SAMENESS. "Also, different genes are contributed from each parent at every fusion that further contributes to loss of sameness. Finally, given equal distribution at each division, other molecules or atoms present in a founding cell are not likely to be present after the clone has produced a lineage of about fifty population doublings." (L. Haflick, contrarian). https://lnkd.in/esfPTAR View in LinkedIn

COMBINATION OF TWO FORMS. “In Physarum, amoebae are typically haploid. Two Physarum amoebae of different mating types combine to create a diploid cell, which then grows by a process involving repeated division without separation of the cytoplasm. The resulting large plasmodium is a single cell with multiple diploid nuclei.” https://ukacc.group.shef.ac.uk/proceedings/control2008/papers/p246.pdf View in LinkedIn

EXACTING POSITION. "Cells at the leading edge of any long lineage do not have the identical molecular content as existed in the founding cell. Even in non-dividing cells, molecular turnover must occur leading to the conclusion that, like dividing cells, non-dividing cells also are not molecularly identical after the passage of time." (L. Haflick, contrarian). https://lnkd.in/esfPTAR View in LinkedIn

FORMING NEW STRUCTURES. “The chemical waves of aggregating Dictyostelium are an excellent example of collective pattern formation. Waves induce chemotaxis towards their centres and can be either circular or spiral in shape; cells aggregating at the centre of each shape will ultimately form a spore body.” https://academic.oup.com/femsre/article/40/6/798/2400841 View in LinkedIn