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"DIFFERENT MORNING GLORY STRAINS are actually created by genetic disruptions caused by jumping genes, and the disruptions of normal gene functions creates the color and shape varieties of the mutants." https://lnkd.in/dxS_fjc View in LinkedIn

"TRANSPOSONS, jumping genes, transposable elements, are pieces of "foreign" DNA that can jump around a genome and from one genome to another genome, and resemble retroviruses like HIV. 90% of the maize genome is transposons and 50% of the human genome. They are key in causing Morning Glory variants." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transposable_element View in LinkedIn

ANTICIPATING MENDELIAN GENETICS. "The Edo Period horticulturists displayed a deep empirical understanding of what we now call Mendel's Laws and the role of factors that affected flower colors and forms that we now know to be caused by transposons or jumping genes." https://lnkd.in/dru85i9 View in LinkedIn

DUTCH TULIP MADNESS. "A particularly rare tulip, Semper Augustus, was priced at around 1,000 guilders in the 1620s. But just before the crash, it was valued at 5,500 guilders per bulb—roughly the cost of luxurious house in Amsterdam. Prices collapsed in February 1637—although data here are particularly poor—and a few investors were left bankrupt." Curiously coincidental with the Edo period in Japan (1603-1867). Also, both flowers are governed by viral/transposon genetics. https://lnkd.in/dvpHgV5 View in LinkedIn

EXOTIC FORMS. "During the Edo Period (1608-1868), without the benefit of Mendelian genetics, Japanese breeders produced thousands of unique morning glories. Many of these strains still exist collected and maintained by the Japanese Museum of Natural History and individual breeding programs. Modern horticulturists in Japan continue to focus on the breeding of new morning glories. In 2005 a morning glory without petals was developed." https://lnkd.in/d_uwQ3a View in LinkedIn

TULIP ORIGINS in Europe are frequently attributed to Turkey or Persia, but the substantial trading activity of the East India Company (and its botanist's avid collections, and botanical diffusions) in Japan at the time of the appearance of tulips in Europe, combined with the avid and advanced horticultural practices in Edo period Japan make the tulip a probable item of horticultural exchange. View in LinkedIn

THE MORNING GLORY VARIANT STRAINS included the native form (deep blue bell), speckled white and blue flowers, flowers with octopus-like white flowers, rimmed flowers, and color variants. Images of these extinct remarkable flowers are not available in the west, but Japanese academics have conserved some of these germlines. https://lnkd.in/d65ZzMp View in LinkedIn

ATAVISMS. Chick embryo gill arches plus mouse molar tissue mosaics grafted into the eyes of nude mice (immunologically privileged sites that permit foreign tissues) formed complete teeth. Activation of vestigial ancient genes. https://lnkd.in/dxQA6w3 View in LinkedIn

ANCESTRAL HORSES had four toes in the front and three in the back, and even earlier horses may have had five toes on each foot. "Modern horses retain but a single toe. They also develop vestiges of the old second and fourth toes as short splints of bone mounted high and inconspicuously above the hoof." Some mutant horses actually grow extra toes. https://lnkd.in/dxQA6w3 View in LinkedIn

HISTORICAL REMNANTS. "Retained tails in humans, or external hindlimbs in cetaceans and snakes—lost from ancestors but present again—are other telltale clues to organismal history, both phylogenetic and ontogenetic, as are the re-emergent “hen’s teeth and horse’s toes” that Gould made famous in his book of the same name." https://evolution-outreach.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s12052-014-0012-5 View in LinkedIn