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Category

Genetics

Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 8, 2021
Categorized
Evolution, Genetics, horizontal gene transfer, Intelligent Design
Tagged
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Mammalian DNA can be airborne too…

Denyse O'Leary
April 8, 2021
Evolution, Genetics, horizontal gene transfer, Intelligent Design
We heard just recently about horizontal gene transfer between herring and smelt. Will we be hearing next about horizontal gene transfer involving mammals via airborne DNA? Don’t rule it out. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
April 1, 2021
Categorized
Biology, Genetics, Intelligent Design, Physics
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Rob Sheldon: Biologists’ use of the term “half-life” shows just how tenuous many of their propositions really are

Denyse O'Leary
April 1, 2021
Biology, Genetics, Intelligent Design, Physics

Recently, our physics color commentator Rob Sheldon took issue with the use of the term “half-life” to describe the survival of DNA in fossils. He says the term has a specific meaning with respect to radioactive decay that just does not apply to other events in nature. In the biology paper at issue, with “half-life” in the name, the authors explain and use the concept in connection with radiocarbon dating: Abstract: Claims of extreme survival of DNA have emphasized the need for reliable models of DNA degradation through time. By analysing mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from 158 radiocarbon-dated bones of the extinct New Zealand moa, we confirm empirically a long-hypothesized exponential decay relationship. The average DNA half-life within this geographically constrained Read More ›

Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 31, 2021
Categorized
Genetics, Intelligent Design
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A zoologist on that microbe that copies its DNA in a way “unknown to science”

Denyse O'Leary
March 31, 2021
Genetics, Intelligent Design
Tim Standish: Simpler systems do not necessarily come first because simple can be a lot harder to come up with than complex. Yes, that seems counterintuitive, but the history of technology bears that out. In some ways you could say the same about art. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 30, 2021
Categorized
Cell biology, Genetics, Intelligent Design
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At New Scientist: “single-celled organism that lacks most of the molecular equipment needed to kick-start DNA replication”

Denyse O'Leary
March 30, 2021
Cell biology, Genetics, Intelligent Design
It's a protist? “Protists are a group of loosely connected, mostly unicellular eukaryotic organisms that are not plants, animals or fungi. There is no single feature such as evolutionary history or morphology common to all these organisms and they are unofficially placed under a separate kingdom called Protista.” In short, just the sort of life form that might be doing something really different. Because nature is full of intelligence, there are probably many alternative programs out there. It all didn’t just somehow happen randomly once. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 27, 2021
Categorized
Culture, Darwinism, Genetics, Intelligent Design, Tree of life
Tagged
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Dawkins’s claim: “every gene delivers approximately the same tree of life” contested at Nature Portfolio Ecology & Evolution

Denyse O'Leary
March 27, 2021
Culture, Darwinism, Genetics, Intelligent Design, Tree of life
You know, Dawkins may be losing his shine. New Scientist was making similar types of noise last October. It's now okay to say when there's something wrong with this stuff. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 25, 2021
Categorized
Cell biology, Darwinism, Genetics, Intelligent Design
Tagged
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Some cells increase gene expression after death

Denyse O'Leary
March 25, 2021
Cell biology, Darwinism, Genetics, Intelligent Design
This cell activity, involving study of brain tissue removed during operations, is an exercise in futility. Maybe those genes are kind of like a school bureaucracy happily presiding over a school with no students or teachers. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 19, 2021
Categorized
Genetics, Intelligent Design
Tagged
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New form of human DNA found – a four-stranded knot

Denyse O'Leary
March 19, 2021
Genetics, Intelligent Design
Researchers: The new shape looks entirely different to the double-stranded DNA double helix... "We think the coming and going of the i-motifs is a clue to what they do. It seems likely that they are there to help switch genes on or off, and to affect whether a gene is actively read or not." Just a random swish of chemicals, right? Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
March 7, 2021
Categorized
Darwinism, Evolution, Genetics, Intelligent Design
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Cornelius Hunter now has a YouTube channel, Darwin’s God

Denyse O'Leary
March 7, 2021
Darwinism, Evolution, Genetics, Intelligent Design
Hunter: Not only is there is no compelling scientific explanation for how the genetic code could have evolved, there also are significant problems with the theory. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 21, 2021
Categorized
'Junk DNA', Culture, Darwinism, Genetics, Genomics, Intelligent Design
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The human genome at 20. We have some answers but way more questions now.

Denyse O'Leary
February 21, 2021
'Junk DNA', Culture, Darwinism, Genetics, Genomics, Intelligent Design
At The Conversation on junk DNA: Bewilderingly, scientists found that the non-coding genome was actually responsible for the majority of information that impacted disease development in humans. Such findings have made it clear that the non-coding genome is actually far more important than previously thought. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 19, 2021
Categorized
Genetics, Intelligent Design
Tagged
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Sequencing oldest DNA ever from mammoths provides a window into limits on recovering DNA

Denyse O'Leary
February 19, 2021
Genetics, Intelligent Design
At Smithsonian Magazine: That Mammuthus columbi originated as a new species, born of a hybridization event, “has major implications for our understanding of the population structure of Pleistocene megabeasts,” MacPhee says. The ancestors of the woolly mammoth and the Krestova mammoth had diverged from each other for about a million years before a population produced a hybrid that was different from both, giving rise to Mammuthus columbi. Read More ›
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
February 17, 2021
Categorized
Culture, Darwinism, Genetics, Intelligent Design
Tagged
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At Nature Heredity Mike Behe vindicated but not cited

Denyse O'Leary
February 17, 2021
Culture, Darwinism, Genetics, Intelligent Design
At Nature Heredity: Discoveries during the subsequent two decades have continued to support the idea that loss of function contributes to adaptation (Murray 2020), with cases of adaptive or beneficial loss of function being discovered across diverse organisms, genes, traits, and environments.” Read More ›