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An aquarium accident may have given this crayfish the DNA to take over the world
Science Mag ^ | Feb. 5, 2018 , 11:00 AM | Elizabeth Pennisi

Posted on 02/05/2018 2:08:22 PM PST by BenLurkin

The marbled crayfish is the only crustacean that reproduces asexually, with the all-female species making clones of itself from eggs unfertilized by sperm...

Since its discovery in 1995 in Germany, the marbled crayfish has spread across Europe and into Africa in huge numbers. “They eat anything—rotten leaves, snails or fish broods, small fish, small insects," says Frank Lyko, a molecular geneticist at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. “This crayfish is a serious pest,”

...

Lyko and his colleagues sequenced genomes of about a dozen marbled crayfish from different parts of the world and performed less detailed genetic analyses of two dozen more from across Madagascar. At 3.5 billion DNA bases in length, the crustacean’s genome is bigger than the human genome, but contains about the same number of genes, 21,000, they report today in Nature Ecology & Evolution. 

...

As suggested by some preliminary evidence, the marbled crayfish has three sets of 92 chromosomes, not the usual two, and each set is essentially a version of the chromosomes belonging to the slough crayfish (P. fallax). Two of the three sets of chromosomes are virtually identical, but the third is different enough that Lyko’s team concludes the marbled crayfish likely arose from the mating of two slough crayfish from different regions of the world thrown together in an aquarium. One must have had an abnormal egg or sperm that retained two copies of its chromosomes instead of the usual single set that is in such germ cells, Lyko explains. The bringing together of the two distant slough crayfish enhanced the genetic variation within the new clonal “species.” Such a union “would never happen in the wild,” he asserts.

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencemag.org ...


TOPICS: Pets/Animals; Science
KEYWORDS: 1995; bcw; crawdads; crayfish; germany; godsgravesglyphs; helixmakemineadouble; marbledcrawdads; marbledcrayfish; sloughcrawdad; sloughcrayfish
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1 posted on 02/05/2018 2:08:22 PM PST by BenLurkin
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To: All

I think I saw this movie. It didn’t show Kurt Russel dying in the end . . . . but it didn’t look good.


2 posted on 02/05/2018 2:10:46 PM PST by BipolarBob (At one time I held the world record as the worlds youngest person on the planet.)
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To: BenLurkin

Me oh my!


3 posted on 02/05/2018 2:11:47 PM PST by TigersEye (Where is the Trump/Russia collusion memo? ... Mueller? Mueller? Anybody?)
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To: BenLurkin
Are they delicious?
4 posted on 02/05/2018 2:13:22 PM PST by Zuse (I am disrupted! I am offended! I am insulted! I am outraged!)
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To: Zuse

Write a grant and get all the money you need. Seems like a lot of money could have spent on some more important things.


5 posted on 02/05/2018 2:16:01 PM PST by DaveA37
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To: BenLurkin

6 posted on 02/05/2018 2:16:41 PM PST by Vaquero (Don't pick a fight with an old guy. If he is too old to fight, he'll just kill you.)
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To: Zuse
Are they delicious?

Yep,whose got the water boiling?

7 posted on 02/05/2018 2:16:55 PM PST by piroque ("In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act")
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To: BenLurkin
crayfish...to take over the world...

First a mouse, now a crayfish.


8 posted on 02/05/2018 2:19:35 PM PST by C210N (It is easier to fool the people than convince them that they have been fooled)
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To: Vaquero

My thought exactly. Teach those euroweenies how to make a good boil.


9 posted on 02/05/2018 2:20:36 PM PST by colorado tanker
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To: C210N
I thought it was cockroaches...



"World Domination!"
10 posted on 02/05/2018 2:20:43 PM PST by dfwgator
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To: BenLurkin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmorkrebs


11 posted on 02/05/2018 2:22:53 PM PST by Red Badger (Wanna surprise? Google your own name. Wanna have fun? Google your friends names......)
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To: BenLurkin

12 posted on 02/05/2018 2:23:18 PM PST by RightGeek (FUBO and the donkey you rode in on)
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To: BenLurkin

If it ever makes it to Louisiana, it’s toast!.............


13 posted on 02/05/2018 2:23:43 PM PST by Red Badger (Wanna surprise? Google your own name. Wanna have fun? Google your friends names......)
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To: Vaquero

We love to have shrimp boils.


14 posted on 02/05/2018 2:24:31 PM PST by Linda Frances (Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness)
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To: BenLurkin

15 posted on 02/05/2018 2:25:11 PM PST by PGR88
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To: BenLurkin

I think it’s time to send in the Cajun Navy again.


16 posted on 02/05/2018 2:26:51 PM PST by freefdny
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To: BenLurkin

17 posted on 02/05/2018 2:27:42 PM PST by Red Badger (Wanna surprise? Google your own name. Wanna have fun? Google your friends names......)
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To: Vaquero

me oh my!


18 posted on 02/05/2018 2:28:16 PM PST by piasa (Attitude adjustments offered here free of charge)
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To: dfwgator

19 posted on 02/05/2018 2:28:21 PM PST by Red Badger (Wanna surprise? Google your own name. Wanna have fun? Google your friends names......)
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To: Vaquero

Yeah, there’s some Cajuns I know that welcome this development.


20 posted on 02/05/2018 2:28:23 PM PST by DannyTN
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