Aug 3, 2026 03:23 PM
(This post was last modified: Aug 3, 2026 04:17 PM by C C.)
Early snakes explored life underground, on land and at sea
https://www.scivillage.com/thread-21019.html
Life speaks one universal language to activate genes. It speaks many more to silence them
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1137882
INTRO: The signals that cells use to switch genes on have remained almost unchanged across two billion years of evolution, but the ones used to switch genes off vary dramatically from one branch of life to another, according to a new study from the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) in Barcelona.
The findings, published today in Nature Genetics, are thanks to the broadest comparative exercise to date of how different life forms regulate their genomes. The study carried out the first detailed analysis of chromatin, the protein scaffold that controls how DNA is read, in several major branches of life that have been largely absent from studies to date, including lineages such as discobans, rhizarians, ichtyosporeans and cryptomonads.
"The cell's instructions for activating genes are essentially the same in a human, a sea anemone and a soil amoeba," says Dr Arnau Sebé-Pedrós, ICREA Research Professor and senior author of the study.
"But the instructions for silencing genes and other genomic elements like transposons have been continuously evolving since our last common eukaryotic ancestor. Different branches of life have developed different molecular toolkits to do the same thing,” he adds.
The work helps understand how genomes evolved on Earth and could have implications for medical research into diseases involving faulty gene regulation. It also delivers a new method, developed at the CRG, which can help support international efforts to characterise life on Earth at the molecular level.
DNA is wrapped, inside every cell, around proteins called histones. Small chemical tags attached to these proteins tell the cell which stretches of DNA to read and which to ignore. The system, known as chromatin regulation, is what allows the same genome to produce a liver cell or a neuron, and a leaf or a root. Faults in the regulation of chromatin underpin many human diseases, including cancers.
The chemical tags are ancient, dating back roughly two billion years to a single-celled organism known as the Last Eukaryotic Common Ancestor, or LECA, the founder of all complex cellular life, from which every plant, animal, fungus and protist on Earth descends.
The enzymes that add and remove the tags are also broadly shared across plants, animals, fungi and microbial eukaryotes. Until now, however, almost all detailed knowledge of how these tags work has come from a handful of laboratory species such as humans, mice, fruit flies, yeast and the model plant Arabidopsis. The vast majority of life's diversity has remained unexplored at this level... (MORE - no ads)
https://www.scivillage.com/thread-21019.html
Life speaks one universal language to activate genes. It speaks many more to silence them
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1137882
INTRO: The signals that cells use to switch genes on have remained almost unchanged across two billion years of evolution, but the ones used to switch genes off vary dramatically from one branch of life to another, according to a new study from the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) in Barcelona.
The findings, published today in Nature Genetics, are thanks to the broadest comparative exercise to date of how different life forms regulate their genomes. The study carried out the first detailed analysis of chromatin, the protein scaffold that controls how DNA is read, in several major branches of life that have been largely absent from studies to date, including lineages such as discobans, rhizarians, ichtyosporeans and cryptomonads.
"The cell's instructions for activating genes are essentially the same in a human, a sea anemone and a soil amoeba," says Dr Arnau Sebé-Pedrós, ICREA Research Professor and senior author of the study.
"But the instructions for silencing genes and other genomic elements like transposons have been continuously evolving since our last common eukaryotic ancestor. Different branches of life have developed different molecular toolkits to do the same thing,” he adds.
The work helps understand how genomes evolved on Earth and could have implications for medical research into diseases involving faulty gene regulation. It also delivers a new method, developed at the CRG, which can help support international efforts to characterise life on Earth at the molecular level.
DNA is wrapped, inside every cell, around proteins called histones. Small chemical tags attached to these proteins tell the cell which stretches of DNA to read and which to ignore. The system, known as chromatin regulation, is what allows the same genome to produce a liver cell or a neuron, and a leaf or a root. Faults in the regulation of chromatin underpin many human diseases, including cancers.
The chemical tags are ancient, dating back roughly two billion years to a single-celled organism known as the Last Eukaryotic Common Ancestor, or LECA, the founder of all complex cellular life, from which every plant, animal, fungus and protist on Earth descends.
The enzymes that add and remove the tags are also broadly shared across plants, animals, fungi and microbial eukaryotes. Until now, however, almost all detailed knowledge of how these tags work has come from a handful of laboratory species such as humans, mice, fruit flies, yeast and the model plant Arabidopsis. The vast majority of life's diversity has remained unexplored at this level... (MORE - no ads)
