Gene experts say we are not entirely human

[Celebration]

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=812162006

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - We may not be entirely human, gene experts said on Thursday after studying the DNA of hundreds of different kinds of bacteria in the human gut.

Bacteria are so important to key functions such as digestion and the immune system that we may be truly symbiotic organisms -- relying on one another for life itself, the scientists write in Friday's issue of the journal Science.

Their findings suggest that studying bacteria native to our bodies may provide important clues to disease, nutrition, obesity and how well drugs will work in individuals, said the team at The Institute for Genomic Research, commonly known as TIGR, in Maryland.

"We are somehow like an amalgam, a mix of bacteria and human cells. There are some estimates that say 90 percent of the cells on our body are actually bacteria," Steven Gill, a molecular biologist formerly at TIGR and now at the State University of New York in Buffalo, said in a telephone interview.

[xchrom]

1. i think the recycling adventure depends on exterior organisms.

not unlike the fungi that lives with leaf cutter ants.

that fungi now exists nowhere else in the world -- only in the nests of the ants.

we can't live without those other organisms.

[Peace Patriot]

2. Oh, heck, I thought it was going to be ALIEN genes that finally explains

what-all went down in the Garden of Eden. I mean, where did we get this 28% of ordinary people and 2% of superduper rich who think George Bush is Jesus and would kill and torture Arabs if He were alive today?

Disappointed. Mere bacteria...

:wow:

[man4allcats]

3. Actually, this idea is not entirely new.

Microbiologist Lynn Margulis proposed the Endosymbiotic Theory decades ago (I first heard of it in the 1970s). The theory proposes that eucaryotic cells (those, such as human cells, that possess a nucleus) actually evolved from symbiotic relationships among procaryotic organisms (procaryotic cells, like bacteria, lack a nucleus). Mitochondria (the energy producers residing in our cells and without which we could not live) and the chloroplasts of green plants bear interesting similarities to procaryotic organisms. The Endosymbiotic Theory suggests that the energy demands of more advanced multicellular organisms might have been made possible through an association with energy transducing microbes, presumably the ancestors of present day mitochondria and chloroplasts which themselves benefited from a more stable environment within the confines of the eucaryotic cell. I read somewhere once, it may have been something by Robert Shapiro, in which the author suggested only half jokingly that perhaps the only purpose for human existence is simply to take our mitochondria for a daily walk. The implication of course is that we and other eucaryotes evolved only as a survival strategy for these procaryotes. Kind of humbling when you think about it.

[Warpy]

4. I remember reading a treatise in the 80s about how all ambulatory

and some stationary life could be seen as mechanisms, perambulating vats of bacteria that the bugs used to distribute themselves over a wider area. It was written by a bacteriologist, of course, but it was in interesting point of view and may be a valid one when expanded upon.

There's an equally interesting point of view that states life is an artifact of planets, and that since bacteria have been found in the most extreme environments on earth, there is no reason to think we would NOT find them on planets with extreme environments.

In any case, we share a remarkable amount of DNA with one celled organisms, showing beyond doubt that we are all related on this planet. It is certain that we are part of a web of life, and any attempt to extricate ourselves from it will destroy us.

[BrklynLiberal]

5. Explains why we get such bad side effects from antibiotics. We kill off

all the "good" bacteria when we are trying to kill off the "bad" bacteria: and why all the antibiotics in our food is slowly killing us.

I avoid antibiotics like the plague.
I think that acidophilus is the miracle drug that we should all be taking every day.