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THIS IS THE END of this long section on the biology of death. The subject is far from over, and the transition is purely artificial. I hope that this series of perspectives from a biological viewpoint, nested in observations and experiments across the living world has been insightful. View in LinkedIn

DNA REPEATS. “Interspersed repeats within genomes are created by transposition events accumulating over evolutionary time. Because interspersed repeats block gene conversion, they protect novel gene sequences from being overwritten by similar gene sequences and thereby facilitate the development of new genes. TEs may also have been co-opted by the vertebrate immune system as a means of producing antibody diversity. The V(D)J recombination system operates by a mechanism similar to that of some TEs.” (TE = transposable elements, jumping genes). https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transposable_element View in LinkedIn

DEATH ANTAGONISTS. "Peter Thiel, the billionaire co-founder of PayPal, plans to live to be 120. Compared with some other tech billionaires, he doesn’t seem particularly ambitious. Dmitry Itskov, the “godfather” of the Russian Internet, says his goal is to live to 10,000; Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle, finds the notion of accepting mortality “incomprehensible,” and Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google, hopes to someday “cure death.” http://www.newsweek.com/2015/03/13/silicon-valley-trying-make-humans-immortal-and-finding-some-success-311402.html View in LinkedIn

INCREASING COMPLEXITY? “There is a widespread assumption that the universe in general, and life in particular, is “getting more complex with time.” https://lnkd.in/euEN3Eh View in LinkedIn

BIOLOGICAL GOAL OF LIFE. What is the end-game of biology? This is an old question, and one that most biologists have felt is not a testable, and thus, not a serious, question. It has been left to philosophy and religion to grapple with. But surely, there are abundant clues in the pure biology, across the immensity of time, to give some wet-based suppositions? This is the subject of the next section of posts. View in LinkedIn

The Apprentice review: Trump, Putin and the subversion of US democracy https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/04/the-apprentice-review-trump-putin-greg-miller-washington-post?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other View in LinkedIn

SO ENDS this two weekend glimpse into jumping genes and their impact on evolution. These massive viral footprints in our genomes underscore the importance of viruses in life on earth. We live with trillions of viruses in our cells, but we have barely scraped the surface of even cataloging, let aline understanding these strange critters. https://theconversation.com/amp/meet-the-trillions-of-viruses-that-make-up-your-virome-104105 View in LinkedIn

FOREIGN GENE INTEGRATION. “It has long been appreciated that viral sequences can become integrated in the genome of their host, either as part of their normal replication cycle or accidently through host-encoded reverse transcription and/or recombination activities. Such integration of viral DNA, when it occurs in the germ cell lineage, can lead to the vertical transmission and fixation of viral sequences in the host population.” https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959437X17301685 View in LinkedIn

WIDE IMPACT ON EVOLUTION. “Here we provide an update on the trends characterizing HTT in eukaryotes, with an emphasis on plants and animals, and we compile a list of cases whereby a given TE shows evidence of HT and has had direct evolutionary consequences for the host lineage where it was introduced.” (TE = transposable elements, jumping genes); (HTT = horizontal transfer of TEs). https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959437X17301685 View in LinkedIn

PROFOUND IMPACT. “Given the profound influence that TEs and their associated activities have exerted on eukaryotic genomes, it follows that the horizontal transfer of TEs (HTT) must represent an important facet of eukaryotic evolution.” (TE = transposable elements, jumping genes). https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959437X17301685 View in LinkedIn