3 ms·

The mention of grafting in the article made me wonder.. Are Apple trees genetically immortal? Eg, they don't have the problems that humans and other mammals ha

The mention of grafting in the article made me wonder.. Are Apple trees genetically immortal? Eg, they don't have the problems that humans and other mammals have with ever shortening telomeres, leading to eventual death?

OJFord 3y ago
The seeds are typically not true to type, so while that doesn't really answer the question I think it makes it irrelevant?
- drewg123 3y ago
  Its orthogonal. Grafting would not work if apple trees had the same issue with shortening telomeres that humans have.
  - OJFord 3y ago
    Well that's answering the question, I admitted I was dodging that - my point was that they're not true anyway so we don't even need to theorise what might happen over generations of reproduction. But perhaps I misunderstood/mis-scoped what was meant by 'immortal'.
warble 3y ago
I only have experience with citrus, but as far as I know you can graft forever. Some variants don't have seeds, this is the only way to propagate them.
anon84873628 3y ago
Short answer is no, not really. Here is a paper on the topic: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6356271/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6356271/ Under laboratory conditions you can regrow a whole plant from an extremely small sample, even down to an individual cell. This is very handy with potatoes for example. Potatoes are notorious for acquiring many different viruses that eventually make a clone line uneconomical or just kill the whole variety altogether. With lab work it is possible to cleanse a potato cell of the virus then propagate many new, clean plants.
fy20 3y ago
Plants still have the same issues with shortening telomeres, but their mechanisms for repairing and maintaining genome stability are much stronger than in mammals. So if you were to take new growth and graft the same variety of apple tree for the next million years, at some point it would no longer be viable. But how many years that would take isn't really known. On a human scale, yes, they can be considered immortal.
- declan_roberts 3y ago
  My understanding is that a scion from new growth effectively resets the clock. As long as you keep grafting healthy scions, the apple trees live forever.

OJFord 3y ago

The seeds are typically not true to type, so while that doesn't really answer the question I think it makes it irrelevant?

drewg123 3y ago
Its orthogonal. Grafting would not work if apple trees had the same issue with shortening telomeres that humans have.
- OJFord 3y ago
  Well that's answering the question, I admitted I was dodging that - my point was that they're not true anyway so we don't even need to theorise what might happen over generations of reproduction. But perhaps I misunderstood/mis-scoped what was meant by 'immortal'.

warble 3y ago

I only have experience with citrus, but as far as I know you can graft forever. Some variants don't have seeds, this is the only way to propagate them.

anon84873628 3y ago

Short answer is no, not really. Here is a paper on the topic: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6356271/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6356271/ Under laboratory conditions you can regrow a whole plant from an extremely small sample, even down to an individual cell. This is very handy with potatoes for example. Potatoes are notorious for acquiring many different viruses that eventually make a clone line uneconomical or just kill the whole variety altogether. With lab work it is possible to cleanse a potato cell of the virus then propagate many new, clean plants.

fy20 3y ago

Plants still have the same issues with shortening telomeres, but their mechanisms for repairing and maintaining genome stability are much stronger than in mammals. So if you were to take new growth and graft the same variety of apple tree for the next million years, at some point it would no longer be viable. But how many years that would take isn't really known. On a human scale, yes, they can be considered immortal.

declan_roberts 3y ago
My understanding is that a scion from new growth effectively resets the clock. As long as you keep grafting healthy scions, the apple trees live forever.