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Add new DNA into the human mitochondria. If you could do that, you unlock a massive amount of science around how mitochondria function, kinda similar to “what I
by koeng 6y ago
Add new DNA into the human mitochondria. If you could do that, you unlock a massive amount of science around how mitochondria function, kinda similar to “what I cannot create I do not understand.
From an engineer’s perspective, mitochondria are kinda the equivalent to virtual machines running on normal computers, as little “virtual cells” within cells. Their genomes are so stripped down that you can do some wild things with them.
- ineedasername 6y agoCan we do this with nuclear DNA?
- klodolph 6y agoThe main human genome is more than 6 orders of magnitude larger than the mitochondrial genome, if you measure by counting base pairs.
- asdff 6y agoYou can. if you want a new piece of DNA stably inserted into the nuclear genome, you have a couple of options: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lentiviral_vector_in_gene_therapy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lentiviral_vector_in_gene_ther... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR These next two do the same thing as CRISPR, only they are older technologies that take you longer to generate the probes in the lab to target your spot in the genome. The real advantage of CRISPR isn't what it does, that was already out there, it's that it's cheap and fast (comparatively) and an undergrad can do the whole experiment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc_finger_nuclease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc_finger_nuclease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcription_activator-like_effector_nuclease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcription_activator-like_e...
- TimSchumann 6y agoMy answer to this question was ‘A John Scalzi Novel.’ But IIRC weren’t mitochondria subsumed by another cell for ATP output forever ago in our evolutionary development?
- koeng 6y agoyep, and you can even make synthetic endosymbionts! (pretty new science too!)
- est31 6y ago> If you could do that, you unlock a massive amount of science around how mitochondria function Note that 99% of the proteins contained in mitochondria are [coded] in the nucleus, only 1% is [coded] in the mitochondrial chromosome. It's extremely small, only containing 37 genes of which most are related to translation (but of course translation requires far more, e.g. elongation factors). https://www.nature.com/articles/nrm2959 https://www.nature.com/articles/nrm2959
- reubenswartz 6y agoI get what you're saying, but I think you have a typo in there. Most of the proteins in the mitochondria are coded by nuclear DNA, but the proteins themselves end up in the mitochondria.
- est31 6y agoThanks! Edited.
- Cieplak 6y agoThe number of genes encoded in the mitochondrial chromosome, 37, reminds me of the 29 states in Von Neumann’s universal constructor [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann_universal_constructor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann_universal_construc...
- koeng 6y agoI guess that was a bit of a hyperbole. You can learn more about the mitochondria genetically engineering the nucleus, but the main problem is that there still is science to be done on the mitochondrial genome that is "locked" down by not being able to transform it, especially when it comes to stuff like how translation works within those mitochondria.