Change to gene theory raises new challenges for biotech

International Harold Tribune ^ | July 3, 2007 | Denise Caruso

[aimhigh]

The $73.5 billion global biotech business may soon have to grapple with a discovery that calls into question the scientific principles on which it was founded.

Last month, a consortium of scientists published findings that challenge the traditional view of the way genes function. The exhaustive, four-year effort was organized by the United States National Human Genome Research Institute and carried out by 35 groups from 80 organizations around the world. To their surprise, researchers found that the human genome might not be a "tidy collection of independent genes" after all, with each sequence of DNA linked to a single function, like a predisposition to diabetes or heart disease.

Instead, genes appear to operate in a complex network, and interact and overlap with one another and with other components in ways not yet fully understood. According to the institute, these findings will challenge scientists "to rethink some long-held views about what genes are and what they do."

Biologists have recorded these network effects for many years in other organisms. But in the world of science, discoveries often do not become part of mainstream thought until they are linked to humans.
....
The principle that gave rise to the biotech industry promised benefits that were equally compelling. Known as the Central Dogma of molecular biology, it stated that each gene in living organisms, from humans to bacteria, carries the information needed to construct one protein. ...

This presumption, now disputed, is what one molecular biologist calls "the industrial gene."

continued..

[aimhigh]

If true, it just keeps getting more compex ..

[BipolarBob]

If we can just complete the tower at Babel, we can achieve supremacy.

[LiteKeeper]

And all of that complexity came about because of random mutations over millions of years.

[fishtank]

“And all of that complexity came about because of random mutations over millions of years.”

Sounds like a faith statement to me!

<\sarc>

[SunkenCiv]

Think of this as the first topic from next week, or as the last topic from this week, depending on whether I put it in digest #155. ;')

To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. Thanks.

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[GovernmentIsTheProblem]

"And all of that complexity came about because of random mutations over millions of years."


Of course not! Meet the Flying Spaghetti Monster. We were touched by His noodly appendage!

[wildbill]

Does it fly by flapping its eyes?

[GraniteStateConservative]

The FSM is love.

[coconutt2000]

Yeah... Got into an argument with my genetics professor over this. Tried to make him explain why more complex interactions between genes and predispositions for specific so-called mutations were impossible.

Seemed to make sense to me that there were fuzzy, complex interactions on the DNA/RNA level. It seemed to fit the data observed. But he said it was impossible and that I was wrong.

Oh well...

[VOA]

To their surprise, researchers found that the human genome
might not be a "tidy collection of independent genes" after all,
with each sequence of DNA linked to a single function,...

As a good scientist told me once:
"Nothing like real data to shatter pre-conceived notions."

[Kevmo]

B4L8r