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DECODING MOLECULAR CHATTER. “As a next step, the researchers will explore how the worms' nervous system senses and deciphers the different chemical messages. "Understanding the worm's language is just a first step -- we now need to figure out how the worm decodes and makes these molecules.” https://lnkd.in/eaB_YWn View in LinkedIn

CHEMICAL LANGUAGE. “These results show that by combining molecules that include different types of chemical building blocks, worms have developed a sophisticated chemical language that they use to organize their communities. The discovery provides a new window into the chemistry of life and suggests that many other animal species including vertebrates may produce similar signaling molecules to control behavior and other biological functions.” https://lnkd.in/eaB_YWn View in LinkedIn

MUTES AND COMMUNICATORS. “Schroeder and his team used a new analytical method called comparative metabolomics to analyze the chemicals made by worms. By comparing the body chemistry of normal, wild-type worms with the chemistry of worms that have a signaling defect, i.e., "worms that can't talk," the researchers detected molecules that were only present in wild-type worms, but not in "silent" worms. These molecules then turned out to form the "language of the worm." https://lnkd.in/eaB_YWn View in LinkedIn

COMBINATORIAL LANGUAGE. “The researchers found several molecules that tell nematodes to scatter and disperse. These molecules consist of only two building blocks. But adding a third building block called an indole changes the meaning completely: instead of "go away" the message becomes "everybody come here." Nematode messages get even more complex by combining two or more different molecules, just like combining different words in a sentence makes for more complex meaning.” https://lnkd.in/eaB_YWn View in LinkedIn

PHYSICAL LANGUAGE. “What we understand now is that nematodes use complex messages that consist of molecules put together in a modular fashion. They put together different chemical fragments depending on what they want to say." https://lnkd.in/eaB_YWn View in LinkedIn

TERRITORIAL. "Other viruses exhibit territorial behavior — marking their infected domain so that others of the same type will not enter and compete with the original infection." https://lnkd.in/eCG7b3z View in LinkedIn

UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS. "A single-celled bacterium is alive, but if you separate the macromolecules that combined to create the bacterium, these units are not alive. Based on our knowledge of macromolecules, we would not have been able to predict that they could combine to form a living organism, nor could we have predicted all of the characteristics of the resulting bacterium." https://lnkd.in/epkJVpt View in LinkedIn

PREDATORS. "Some viruses also exhibit predatory behavior. For instance, the DenZuk virus will seek out and overwrite instances of the Brain virus if both are present on the same system." https://lnkd.in/eCG7b3z View in LinkedIn

PRIMORDIAL DIGITAL SOUP. "Someday the Net will be the summation of the world's total computing resources. All computers will link up into a chaotic digital soup in which everything is connected - indirectly or directly - to everything else." https://lnkd.in/e6ExXVY View in LinkedIn

ADAPTED SPECIES. "Computer viruses exhibit “species” with well-defined ecological niches based on host machine type, and variations within these species. These species are adapted to specific environments and will not survive if moved to a different environment." https://lnkd.in/eCG7b3z View in LinkedIn