Posted: 4/9/2011 11:39:04 AM EDT
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It doesn't have a very sexy name, but tC19Z, synthesised in a lab in Cambridge, UK, could be a version of one of the first enzymes that ever existed on our planet - and a clue to how life itself got started. In a neat twist, Holliger's team also showed that tC19Z can make copies of another RNA enzyme, which then worked correctly. That suggests that, once the first self-replicating RNA had appeared, it would have been able to surround itself with additional molecular equipment, kick-starting the evolution of more complex life. http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2011/04/rna-enzyme-makes-another-rna-e.html |
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what round for self-replicating RNA? Stock up, before it's too late. |
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That is totally nerd core. |
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[golf clap] |
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Quoted: Quoted: Wow it looks like tC19Z has a designer.  I wonder if tC19Z's descendants, millions of years from now, will sit around debating whether Holliger created tC19Z or not, and if they need to pray to Holliger for their immortal souls Our Father in Heaven Hollinger be thy name... |
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Quoted: Quoted: Wow it looks like tC19Z has a designer. I wonder if tC19Z's descendants, millions of years from now, will sit around debating whether Holliger created tC19Z or not, and if they need to pray to Holliger for their immortal souls They will if they know what is good for them. And if not then the righteous shall move against them. |
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Quoted: Or will they assume that since Holliger had the power to create them, than he must necessarily be good and perfect? Quoted: Wow it looks like tC19Z has a designer. I wonder if tC19Z's descendants, millions of years from now, will sit around debating whether Holliger created tC19Z or not, and if they need to pray to Holliger for their immortal souls |
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Get back to me when Holliger actually creates something...he did nothing more than rearrange things that were already created. You are saying it would be more meaningful if he had arranged each atom by hand, from virgin atoms? Or does he need to have created the RNA directly from energy? |
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Get back to me when Holliger actually creates something...he did nothing more than rearrange things that were already created. You say that as if it could occur any other way. Ever here the joke about the Scientist and God?.........short version...Scientist is bragging he can create life...God tells him.."prove it" Scientist bends over and grabs a handful of dirt....God says...No...get your own dirt. |
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Get back to me when Holliger actually creates something...he did nothing more than rearrange things that were already created. Religious Guy: God created life on earth. Science Guy: No he didn't, life evolved from something like this RNA I just created. RG: Well, God created the molecules you used to make that RNA, so God made the RNA, so then God created life. SG, Hey, I just created the molecules needed to make the RNA, which was needed for life to evolve from. RG: So, God created whatever you made those molecules with, which means he created the molecules, then the RNA, which means he created life. SG: Hey, I just created the atoms used to make the molecules used to make the the RNA that life is thought to have evolved from. RG: Ha! God created whatever you made those atoms from, so that means he made the atoms! If he made the atoms, then he made the molecules and then then RNA and then created life! SG: I just created the protons and electrons used to make the atoms that I created then the molecules that I used to make the RNA that life evolved from. RG: No! It was Go... SG: You never stop, do you??? |
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Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Get back to me when Holliger actually creates something...he did nothing more than rearrange things that were already created. You say that as if it could occur any other way. Ever here the joke about the Scientist and God?.........short version...Scientist is bragging he can create life...God tells him.."prove it" Scientist bends over and grabs a handful of dirt....God says...No...get your own dirt. Um, yeah... That's not a joke on me. |
OK, the RNA enzyme he created is about 200 nucleotides long. I didn't look up the paper, so I'll assume that it's double stranded RNA, so it contains a total of 400 nucleotides. The structure above is a single RNA nucleotide. I can tell you that without an organism producing it, the odds of randomly creating a single RNA nucleotide is infinitesimal. The odds of creating an RNA strand with 400 of them, all in the right sequence? Even less. Discuss. RF |
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Quoted: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/31/Nucleotides_v2.png OK, the RNA enzyme he created is about 200 nucleotides long. I didn't look up the paper, so I'll assume that it's double stranded RNA, so it contains a total of 400 nucleotides. The structure above is a single RNA nucleotide. I can tell you that without an organism producing it, the odds of randomly creating a single RNA nucleotide is infinitesimal. The odds of creating an RNA strand with 400 of them, all in the right sequence? Even less. Discuss. RF First, the Miller-Urey experiment and Juan Oro showed that RNA could be created in the hypothesized early Earth conditions. Second, you're operating under the assumption that the first ribozyme was 200 bases. R18 is a single stranded ribozyme and tC19Z is modified version of R18. Comparing R18 to tC19Z, R18 doesn't have all the bases in the right spot. However, R18 still does something. There was a pre-cursor to R18 that had a RNA binding domain and did something at some level. One of the smallest known ribozymes is 13 bases, called hammerhead. The smallest is Vg1 and requires a 4 base sequence and a 3 base sequence complex. The odds of creating the 13 base hammerhead at random is 1:4^13, or 1:~67.1 million. One mole of nucleosides has 6.022x10^23 available bases for random incorporation, but one mole is quite a lot so give it millions of years to randomly happen. Also, keep in mind, once the 13 base ribozyme has randomly assembled it contains an RNA binding region to go out and play with other randomly created RNA strands. |
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Quoted: Quoted: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/31/Nucleotides_v2.png OK, the RNA enzyme he created is about 200 nucleotides long. I didn't look up the paper, so I'll assume that it's double stranded RNA, so it contains a total of 400 nucleotides. The structure above is a single RNA nucleotide. I can tell you that without an organism producing it, the odds of randomly creating a single RNA nucleotide is infinitesimal. The odds of creating an RNA strand with 400 of them, all in the right sequence? Even less. Discuss. RF First, the Miller-Urey experiment and Juan Oro showed that RNA could be created in the hypothesized early Earth conditions. Second, you're operating under the assumption that the first ribozyme was 200 bases. R18 is a single stranded ribozyme and tC19Z is modified version of R18. Comparing R18 to tC19Z, R18 doesn't have all the bases in the right spot. However, R18 still does something. There was a pre-cursor to R18 that had a RNA binding domain and did something at some level. One of the smallest known ribozymes is 13 bases, called hammerhead. The smallest is Vg1 and requires a 4 base sequence and a 3 base sequence complex. The odds of creating the 13 base hammerhead at random is 1:4^13, or 1:~67.1 million. One mole of nucleosides has 6.022x10^23 available bases for random incorporation, but one mole is quite a lot so give it millions of years to randomly happen. Also, keep in mind, once the 13 base ribozyme has randomly assembled it contains an RNA binding region to go out and play with other randomly created RNA strands.  |
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http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/31/Nucleotides_v2.png OK, the RNA enzyme he created is about 200 nucleotides long. I didn't look up the paper, so I'll assume that it's double stranded RNA, so it contains a total of 400 nucleotides. The structure above is a single RNA nucleotide. I can tell you that without an organism producing it, the odds of randomly creating a single RNA nucleotide is infinitesimal. The odds of creating an RNA strand with 400 of them, all in the right sequence? Even less. Discuss. RF That was my first thought. Even if a scientist did create life from unliving building blocks, what is the mathmatical odds of it happening randomly? And then happen often enough and in the right conditions to take hold and evolve into something meaningful? No matter what your belief in God is the odds of life being a "random" event are just to great to even consider as a possiblilty. |
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[golf clap] Seriously. |
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That was my first thought. Even if a scientist did create life from unliving building blocks, what is the mathmatical odds of it happening randomly? And then happen often enough and in the right conditions to take hold and evolve into something meaningful? No matter what your belief in God is the odds of life being a "random" event are just to great to even consider as a possiblilty. 4.6 BILLION years. An entire world's worth of oceans and millions of miles of shoreline. Meteor impacts, lightning strikes, volcanic eruptions, and hydrothermal vents. It's stunning to me that God could conceivably have snapped his fingers and created a singularity that exploded into a nearly infinite universe full of stars that build increasingly heavy elements and worlds that form self regulating systems due solely to how all the parts fit together, and yet people still want to insist that God actually made Adam out of mud. It is clear that of all of God's gifts, the one most often misused is the freedom to be obtuse. |
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Quoted: That was my first thought. Even if a scientist did create life from unliving building blocks, what is the mathmatical odds of it happening randomly? More than you think when you have a solid understanding of the science. The thing is most people haven't spent a decade in college earning a PhD so it seems far too random because people don't understand how molecules that aren't alive are capable of interacting with each other to do remarkable things. And then happen often enough and in the right conditions to take hold and evolve into something meaningful? Often enough? Do you understand the time of humans is minuscule in comparison to the time of the Earth? A human's perception is altered because of their lifespan. What humans perceive as "often enough" for significance from our piddly 100 year life span isn't anything when considering the Earth is 4.6 billion years old. The oldest microbe-like fossils are 3.5 billion years old. It took 1 billion years to get to the point of microbe-like organisms. "Often enough" can happen in 1 billion years, most people just can't comprehend the magnitude of time. Miller and Urey made complex molecules in a simple apparatus in a matter of weeks. If we could let the experiment run for 1 billion years we just may see how life evolves. The right conditions for chemistry to occur is pretty loose. You're thinking is too narrow from your high school chemistry, or biology, where you were always dealing with optimized chemistry because if you can make a reaction more efficient it demonstrates you understand the fundamentals. Chemical reactions can still occur at non-optimal conditions; you can get better results, and more yield, when the conditions are optimal. That doesn't negate the fact that you can still get product at a lower yield from non-optimal conditions. Are you aware that 12.0107 grams of carbon has 6.022x10^23 molecules of carbon in it? If I put 12.0107 femto-grams (10^-15) of that carbon to good use there are 6.022x10^8 carbon molecules now put to good use, that's 602,200,000 if you're not good with scientific notation. If someone gave you that many pennies you'd have over $6 million dollars. No matter what your belief in God is the odds of life being a "random" event are just to great to even consider as a possiblilty. |
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Anyone reading this thread who is also interested in current intelligent design trends/ideologies might find their way over to:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/ http://www.uncommondescent.com/ http://www.idthefuture.com/ http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/ http://www.telicthoughts.com/ You are warned. I can equal exceed in volume, potency and toxicity any venom that is spewed at me for posting the above links. |
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Quoted: Anyone reading this thread who is also interested in current intelligent design trends/ideologies might find their way over to: http://www.evolutionnews.org/ http://www.uncommondescent.com/ http://www.idthefuture.com/ http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/ http://www.telicthoughts.com/ You are warned. I can equal exceed in volume, potency and toxicity any venom that is spewed at me for posting the above links. Why would we spew venom at someone incapable of having a rational discussion about the subject at hand? ID isn't science, simple. |