Epigenetics - A Win for Evolution!

http://www.newsweek.com...

Check it.

Interesting. I always figured that environment had a huge factor on genetic traits, and that example of identical twins inheriting genetic diseases, but those diseases can occur or be "silenced" depending upon how the individual twin lives his/her life, seems very accurate with what I've read and what I've seen.

Good job finding this Toast!

Questionable find.

I have reason to believe that this isn't actually the passing down of traits, but more so the turning on and off of traits that already developed by natural selection.

Simply put, Lamarkian evolution would be akin to a mother writing an instruction manual for her child and the child would alter it and pass the altered version on to her child.

What I believe happened in this case, is that the mating rituals and habits developed and became encoded together. The instruction manual has instructions on how to respond to the environment, and the instruction manual gets passed on without getting altered.

Phenotypical changes without Genotypical changes.

I'm glad to be back after a long absence due to personal reasons, but this "find" is very questionable. Newsweek is not a Science Journal and I am not sure the near Lamarckian traits can be attributed to anything other than currently known evolutionary processes. I will try to look into this more. A win for evolution? Why worry about wins when the theory has dominated life sciences for over a century? Interesting work, but I need to see the peer review and review it myself. Good article for discussion so thank you for presenting it.

@ sherlock/Kleptin

Ditto. I'd like nothing more than a firm proof of epigenetics, because it completely knocks out the huge anti-evolution, 'random mutation only' theory. If epigenetics turns out to be scientifically sound, it goes to show that evolution can indeed answer for these claims. That's what the current arguments against evolution amount to, and by showing that even one random mutation can lead to the domination of said trait, we can solve for this 'problem'.

At 10/8/2009 2:52:43 PM, Kleptin wrote:
Questionable find.

Not at all. See an egg as a sort of computer. It has two parts, the code (DNA) and the hardware that implements the code (the rest of the fertilized egg). Now obviously changes in the egg, including simple changes of chemical balances, may change how the code is interpreted. And some of those changes can very well be inherited.

It's very common to see the DNA as separate from the rest of the cell, and for example propose to regenerate dinosaurs by putting Dinosaur DNA in a ostrich-egg! But that would only create and approximation. We could never be sure a regenerated Tyrannosaurus that has feathers would be proof that a real one had feathers, because it's not made with a T-Rex egg, but a bird egg, etc.

So that there can be inherited traits that come not from DNA but from other parts of cell chemistry is completely expected and not in any way strange. But there is not many cases of it found.

However, the statement "epigenetic mechanisms may also explain why identical twins, who inherit identical genes, have different traits, including genetic diseases: the different lives the twins lead cause some disease genes, including those linked to cancer and schizophrenia, to switch off" is nonsense. That has nothing to do epigenetics, just with the simple fact that in the question of "nature or nurture" then answer is almost always "both".

At 10/11/2009 4:27:30 AM, regebro wrote:

At 10/8/2009 2:52:43 PM, Kleptin wrote:
Questionable find.

Not at all. See an egg as a sort of computer. It has two parts, the code (DNA) and the hardware that implements the code (the rest of the fertilized egg). Now obviously changes in the egg, including simple changes of chemical balances, may change how the code is interpreted. And some of those changes can very well be inherited.

It's very common to see the DNA as separate from the rest of the cell, and for example propose to regenerate dinosaurs by putting Dinosaur DNA in a ostrich-egg! But that would only create and approximation. We could never be sure a regenerated Tyrannosaurus that has feathers would be proof that a real one had feathers, because it's not made with a T-Rex egg, but a bird egg, etc.

So that there can be inherited traits that come not from DNA but from other parts of cell chemistry is completely expected and not in any way strange. But there is not many cases of it found.

However, the statement "epigenetic mechanisms may also explain why identical twins, who inherit identical genes, have different traits, including genetic diseases: the different lives the twins lead cause some disease genes, including those linked to cancer and schizophrenia, to switch off" is nonsense. That has nothing to do epigenetics, just with the simple fact that in the question of "nature or nurture" then answer is almost always "both".

That's almost exactly what I said, but with a better analogy XD

The "unexpected" parts that you mention are actually proteins transcribed from the actual DNA. Theoretically, DNA itself is enough and doesn't require any other mechanisms for the human, because DNA would code for the very proteins used to regulate it.

However, the point that I was emphasizing in my last post, was that there was no sign of actual genetic change, as in, alteration of the genetic material passed down from one generation to the next. As you've said, it's purely a somatic effect. I summed it up as "Phenotypical without Genotypical".

Simply put, this is not even an example of mutation.