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Mitochondria Are Alive
- adastra22 2y agoI don’t understand the headline (yes I skimmed the article). Why would mitochondria not be alive? What does that even mean?
- ssalka 2y agoI imagine it's similar to how viruses are not considered to be alive, since they cannot reproduce without a host cell? But I have never been a fan of that argument either, both seem alive to me.
- georgeecollins 2y agoI think the idea here is that mitochondria developed independent of cells and later lived exclusively inside of them. In other words, they reproduced without cells. I am not sure, please correct me if I am wrong.
- semperdark 2y agoYou're not wrong. But over the enormous amount of time since, the "duplicate" organelles and systems needed for independent living were steadily carved out of mitochondria. While they do have their own DNA and replication process, the DNA is basically limited to specific things they need to perform their energy-generation functions and the replication happens when triggered by host cell replication. It's a bit like if you took the heart from an animal and transplanted it into a human: is it meaningful to call it independently alive? Maybe, it depends what question you're trying to ask.
- dekhn 2y agoNo, the predecessors of mitochondria were also cells and they reproduced through cellular division.
- adastra22 2y agoI don't know of any definition of "alive" that can survive application of a reductive understanding of biology that doesn't either count viruses as being "alive," or decide that nothing is alive. The uncertainty, I understood, was whether to classify them as distinct organisms the way we classify other species, as they are intrinsically parasitic for their replicative capability.
- larkost 2y agoOutside of a host cell viruses do not fit any of the definitions of life: - they do not seek or consume sources of nutrients or energy - they do not have a metabolism - they do not grow In fact the only place they fit the definition is reproduction, and that is only through the machinery they commandeer from the cells they infect. To me viruses clearly do not fit the definition of life. But fire... that is hard to exclude from the definition without some mental contortions. I am not advocating that fire is alive for any useful reason, but it is hard to exclude from the definition.
- georgeecollins 2y agoI am terrible at biology but I will try. The idea is that mitochondria is not a component of a living organism, but an organism that once lived independently of the cell.
- UncleOxidant 2y ago"If we think of mitochondria as non-living organelles..." mitochondria were thought to just be a component of the cell. But they have their own DNA separate from that in the cell's nucleus. They replicate on their own like bacteria.
- marcosdumay 2y ago> mitochondria were thought to just be a component of the cell. ... hundreds of years ago, for a short time after they were discovered. We know that they behave like bacteria for almost as long as we know that they exist.
- outworlder 2y agoThey "behave as" bacteria. Are they bacteria? Are they 'alive' by themselves? That's the distinction.
- marcosdumay 2y ago> Are they 'alive' by themselves? That's a discussion about word semantics that has no relation to biology. Biologists have been occupied with it for centuries, just like computer people have lost time on "what's intelligence?", but neither one is relevant for either field. > Are they bacteria? Once upon a time, their ancestors were. I do not know exactly where biologists trace the line, but this is also about word semantics. It's just a case of it that helps people communicate better, so there is a line, I just don't know what it is.
- adastra22 2y agoWhat do you mean by "alive?" Because of course they are alive, regardless of whether you consider them bacteria or not. There is a strange definition of "alive" that is being used by you and the author article that I'm not understanding. If a mitochondria is not "alive," then is it dead? Even if it is taking part in an active, living cell?
- adastra22 2y ago
- kranke155 2y agoI wonder what mitochondria dream about. Do they have elections? Politics? Their own understanding of the universe, that somehow ends on the skin surface?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Teever 2y agoAs a layman I'm kind of baffled by the enduring pop-sci interest in mitochondria. To me the far more interesting organelle is the ribosome. This elegant self-replicating machine that is highly conserved across lifeforms is fascinating and much closer to the origin of life than mitochondria. How did ribosomes evolve? Are the ribosomes that we see in modern organisms the first design that did evolve? Why are they highly conserved? Are ribosomes alive as well?
- dangsux 2y ago[dead]
- adastra22 2y agoThe mitochondria and their dysfunction are likely the basis of most aspects of aging, so an intensive interest in them is understandable.
- rustcleaner 2y agoI expect such lively news to make this comment section the powerhouse of the front page. :^)
- cmiller1 2y agoIt's funny that this phrase has had such staying strength, while the key word in it, "powerhouse," has fallen out of fashion. The more modern American English way to phrase it would be "the power plant of the cell."
- selimthegrim 2y agoI’m pretty sure people still talk about powerhouses of hydroelectric dams
- jagged-chisel 2y agoCan you describe the distinction?
- AdmiralAsshat 2y agoDistinction: I am a millennial, and actually had to go look up just now what a "powerhouse" is. I am familiar with the term in its metaphorical sense, but was heretofore unacquainted with the literal definition. "Power plant" or "power station" would, yes, be more immediately understood by my generation. The phrase "Mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell" would read to modern children like saying "The mitochondrion is the rock star of the cell." These things do happen. I was in my 30s before I learned what the "firewall" of a car was...
- mkaic 2y agoAnecdotally, I feel like I've heard "powerhouse" used somewhat regularly when describing impressive people, i.e.: "Such-and-such is an absolute powerhouse on the field", or "That person is so productive, they're a powerhouse". So maybe the original usage has been subsumed by "power plant", but I think the word has alternative meanings which persist.
- 2y ago
- wwwtyro 2y agoI'm sure there's a fantastic midi-chlorian joke here.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- GaryNumanVevo 2y agothe mitochondria are alive, and they're doing just fine
- netcraft 2y agothis is the first ive heard of mitochondria replicating separately and distinctly from the host cell, how fascinating! Are we saying that mitochondria have their own life cycle inside of a cell? living/dying/replicating in the span of the "life" of a single host cell? When a host cell reproduces, how does the mitochondria get produced in the new cell to get things started? Cant wait to research this later.
- marcosdumay 2y ago> When a host cell reproduces, how does the mitochondria get produced in the new cell to get things started? Each half of the cell keeps the mitocondria that were living inside it.
- andrewla 2y agoThe two halves of the divided cells will usually both have mitochondria. Not always, though; sometimes cell division leaves one cell without any mitochrondria. That usually results in a non-viable cell, but sometimes the cell can survive with limited capacity. Some species that used to have mitochondria have apparently been through this process and have evolved to survive in their absence; Giardia duodenalis for example.
- debacle 2y ago> If one considers bacteria as living entities — and all biologists seem to — then it is impossible to explain why mitochondria are not. There seems to be a strange, half-hubris, half-pride vein that runs through Humanity that would see us as lesser for being hosts to benevolent bacteria, despite us very obviously being unable to survive without benevolent bacteria.
- jcims 2y agoI think it just attacks the wholeness of ‘self’ and starts to reveal the true complexity of nature.
- echelon 2y agoWe didn't evolve to understand "self", and indeed most animals do not. There was no evolutionary pressure to do so. We're having to discover it piece by piece.
- r14c 2y agoWe aren't driven solely by evolutionary pressure. We can (and have) developed cultures that can easily accept that humans are "just" part of a larger system, even having a unique role, without having to be superior. Our culture isn't like that, of course. We are obviously doing a good job of being "in charge" of the planet and definitely not charging headfirst into a mass extinction event with our collective eyes closed.
- shawnz 2y agoWe had evolutionary pressure to evolve self-preservation, and that stars with self, doesn't it?
- robertlagrant 2y agoEveryone knows we're already that. The importance of gut microbiome for one - cited loads.
- dist-epoch 2y ago
- readthenotes1 2y ago"In the early 19th century, " With that level of proofreading, I'm not sure what else was wrong in the article...
- arcticbull 2y agoFeels analogous to the CPU and the Management Engine heh.
- csours 2y agoFor a fictional macro version of the Margulis hypothesis, I'd recommend 'Alien Clay' by Adrian Tchaikovsky
- euparkeria 2y agoIt reminds me the game Parasite Eve.
- anthk 2y agoMost of the Japanese games/media foreshadow/hint you about actual or potential facts written in papers but not understandable to teenagers until theẏ grow up.
- falsaberN1 2y agoI don't know why this is being downvoted. It's quite apropos for being a piece of fiction toying with this very concept. It is a videogame based on/continuing a cheesy scifi novel that played with the concept of mitochondria being alive (also sentient). Sure it's not quite scientifically sound, but it still explains the concept with enough actual facts (very easy to distinguish from the fictional ones), and the ludicrous nature of it all makes it so you won't *ever* forget that mitochondria are in fact a part of the cell and their normal function is being involved in energy production. I can warrant 90% of people who ever thought about the mitochondrion's existence and function (beyond basic school formation) that aren't working or studying in related fields are just people who played this game. I can bet there's a non-zero amount of scientists that got into this stuff because they played the game as kids or teens.
- escapecharacter 2y agoIf we label mitochondria as alive, that would mean prison laborers must count as living, too.
- MrMcCall 2y agoSir/Ma'am, I live in America. What is reasonable and compassionate and sensible is simply beyond the grasp of most everyone, looks to me.
- otabdeveloper4 2y ago> thinly veiled abortion argument Kek.
- kylehotchkiss 2y agoInteresting argument > control bioenergetics across the eukaryotic tree of life. What types of outcomes do we unlock when we can control bioenergetics?
- dekhn 2y agounlimited power
- pieter_mj 2y agoI'll add the following to the conversation : https://x.com/niko_kukushkin/status/1854593093636350387 https://x.com/niko_kukushkin/status/1854593093636350387 and https://web.archive.org/web/20170506064530/https://inference-review.com/article/the-excitable-mitochondria https://web.archive.org/web/20170506064530/https://inference...
- j_bum 2y agoAny time I read a mitochondria post like this, I strongly recommend that others who find the topic interesting check out Power, Sex, and Suicide by Nick Lane. Excellent book!
- meowkit 2y ago+1 to Nick Lane I’ve only read The Vital Question, but I felt it was a great introduction to biochem for someone not in the field.
- pkghost 2y agoAbsolutely loved TVQ. The insight about mitochondrial DNA inheritance being exclusively from the mother, thus motivating female fingerprinting of male nucleic DNA for gamete viability (via courtship rituals, pheromones, plumage, etc)...
- rsync 2y agoCame here to recommend Power, Sex, and Suicide. It is a fascinating book.
- grantmuller 2y agoThe Vital Question covers this topic and is in general a really great basic education in biological energy production.
- TeeMassive 2y ago> Mitochondrial DNA mutates 100-1,000 times faster than the human genome This statement is very interesting for two reasons: 1) We not consider mitochondrial DNA as part of the human genome when it's clearly is and can be used to establish the maternal genetic lineage. 2) Traditionally, we always think of telomere reduction and genetic mutations as the root cause of aging but not mitochondrial genetic damages.
- rbanffy 2y ago> 2) Traditionally, we always think of telomere reduction and genetic mutations as the root cause of aging but not mitochondrial genetic damages. A lot of research is looking into the role of mitochondrial damage as causes for a number of conditions.
- swasheck 2y agoa lot of focus on the definition of "alive" in the comments, but i think that the weight of this rests on it being a step toward confirming the endosymbiotic relationship theory which states that mitochondria were potentially part of another eukaryotic cells carrying what would become mitogchodria were engulfed by another cell. this affected cellular development by outsourcing energy production for the cell itself. a lot of times the results seem "self-evident" but you still have to find evidence to support or reject a theory and this seems like a step in that direction.
- ramon156 2y agoI still think about the fact that we're this close to proving the protocell theory, proving that we can create life from no life. Last time I read about it was 2021, and I'm really curious when the day arises we succeed
- renewiltord 2y agoThey are obviously alive, but also we are obviously a colony organism. The various bacteria we transmit from mother to child, the mitochondria inherent to our cells, all of this stuff is just part of a self-similarity of life from top to bottom. With sufficient zoom-out, we need not treat individuals (or pairs) as the only unit of life replication.
- andrewla 2y agoI read the article waiting for an answer to the question "in what operational sense does this matter?" but it never arrived. The question posed is whether we consider mitochondria to be "alive". It's just a word, who cares. What do we do differently given this assumption?
- bmacho 2y agoEw. That's always an uncomfortable read.
- pizzathyme 2y agoExactly. Seems similar to "are LLMs alive"? What practical purpose would an answer to that question serve?
- The_Colonel 2y agoThat seems to be an overly reductive view on the value of knowledge. What practical purpose does studying ancient civilizations have? Why do we send expensive telescopes into space to study faraway galaxies and try to uncover mysteries of the big bang? When can we expect the results from number theory to lower the price of gas at the pump?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- andrewla 2y agoBut the definition of a word is not knowledge. Knowing that mitochondria have their own DNA is knowledge. Knowing that they reproduce independently of their home cell is knowledge. Learning whether they evolved from a separate viable organism would be knowledge. Learning whether we can make them viable, or breed them separately, and use them in therapies -- all knowledge. Whether they are "alive" or not is just the definition of a word.
- dekhn 2y ago
- MostlyStable 2y ago>Defining mitochondria as “nonliving” isn’t just a classification mistake, nor a question of word choice. Rather, it is a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature and role of mitochondria. It inherently undermines our understanding of biological systems and deeply influences the tools we build to study them. This assertion is made but not supported. I don't think I understand the importance of this distinction, assuming that everyone already agrees about the evolutionary and mechanical facts about mitochondria, but as far as I can tell, no one disagrees that mitochondria were originally free living cells, or that they have their own DNA, or any of the other relevant facts about their origins or how they work in the cell. It's merely an argument about what it means to be alive. Which is philosophically interesting, but practically unimportant for the practice of biology. This seems like a purely semantic debate with no broader importance.
- wrycoder 2y agoFrom an article cited in the OP [0], More than 95% of all proteins located in the mitochondrial compartments are encoded by the nuclear DNA, synthesized in cytoplasmic ribosomes and imported into mitochondria. These include factors that regulate mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) gene expression such as mtDNA and RNA polymerases, mitochondrial transcription factors, RNA processing and modifying enzymes, transcription termination factors, mitochondrial ribosomal proteins, aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases, and translation factors (1, 2). It's clear that a mitrochondrial element can't live for long without the presence of the host cells, so, like a virus, it doesn't meet all the requirements to be considered fully living. [0] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC23071/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC23071/
- m3kw9 2y agoSo what now? We give them rights?
- itsafarqueue 2y agoOr deport them.
- IAmNotACellist 2y agoThe fact that every child on the planet is religiously taught that the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell is all the evidence I need that we're upholding a primordial contractual agreement and these are the conditions to which we are beholden. Name a single biological entity that has a better PR department. The only one that comes close is Athlete's Foot, which makes the victim sound cool.
- com2kid 2y agoI actually never heard the phrase until I got online and saw the meme! My biology classes did have us gene editing bacteria to chance its color. That was fun! > The only one that comes close is Athlete's Foot, which makes the victim sound cool. The best cure for athletes foot is a 30 minute soak in diluted bleach. Get a wash basin, fill it with warm water, and add enough bleach so that it tingles a little bit. Do this every other day 3 times, e.g. Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Problem solved. Make sure to clean out the shoes as well, ideally not wearing any infected shoes for a few days at least, and soak the insides with Lysol a few times to prevent reinfection.
- protonbob 2y agoAccording to my doctor, this can weaken the skin too much. 30 minutes is quite a long time.
- com2kid 2y agoDepends on how diluted the bleach is. Also 30 minutes may be more than necessary, but it's what I've always done for athlete's foot. For other random crap that's tries to grow on my skin I'll dilute some bleach on a paper towel and let that sit on whatever is trying to eat me. The basis of this technique is that you have skin to spare, and your skin regrows. Unlike the fungus.
- beng-nl 2y agoI have the same experience - never heard of it until I saw the meme. I have a feeling it’s something local to American schoolchildren.
- JumpCrisscross 2y agoMitochondria are why I’m a Rare Earther. In Earth’s history, mitochondrial endosymbiosis occurred once. Without that you don’t have the energy budget for complex life. Moreover, there may be a narrow window where it can happen: modern microbiology has defences and selection pressures that it make inhospitable to the hobbling chimeræ the first mitochondrial cells would have been. Until mitochondria, the emergence of life from nothing is plausible. With mitochondria, its progression to complex, multicellular and intelligent life makes sense. Both processes in small steps can be replicated, more or less, in the lab. But that one moment is not and has not been. As a result, I think the universe has lots of living slop but very few plants and animals. (Aside, look at ATP go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUrEewYLIQg&t=939s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUrEewYLIQg&t=939s)
- outworlder 2y agoMitochondria seems to have been an 'accident', yes. That does not mean that other lifeforms in different planets require mitochondria or equivalent organelles. As long as they can perform the necessary chemical reactions (which could be different in a different environments) and extract enough energy, they should be good. How did mitochondria evolve in the first place? Could they have remained as independent organisms and use their massive energy budget to evolve independently?
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago> long as they can perform the necessary chemical reactions That mitochondria are conserved as an independent organelle across almost [1] all eukaryotes, across billions of years of history, suggests this is something the nuclear can’t easily in house. [1] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6343361/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6343361/
- outworlder 2y agoMaybe! That could also suggest that any other strategies were just out competed by this one and lost the opportunity to develop further.
- armoredkitten 2y agoTalking about what is considered "alive" is an interesting exercise, and shows just how fuzzy those boundaries can be sometimes. But I really don't see how this has any practical impact on how we study mitochondria. > If we think of mitochondria as non-living organelles, how will we ever harness their full potential? Whenever anyone uses the "harnessing [its] full potential" cliché, my bullshit alarm starts buzzing. I don't think this article is bullshit, but...we can "harness" as much "potential" as mitochondria have whether we consider them alive or not.
- habitue 2y ago> If we think of mitochondria as non-living organelles, how will we ever harness their full potential? "Alive" is a fuzzy boundary in concept space that helps humans navigate a fractally complex world. It's not a fact about mitochondria that either hides or reveals structure. We can harness the potential of viruses, and reasonable people can disagree on whether they are alive.
- roncesvalles 2y agoIt's such highly unlikely chance events that make me think we really are alone in the universe (we = a sentient civilizational lifeform). There's just no way the long series of extremely improbable events that led to our rise was replicated anywhere else, and it took the sheer vastness of this universe for it to have emerged even once.
- a-curious-crow 2y agouniverse big
- rsync 2y agoThere is ~1M bacteria in a single drop of seawater. Now multiply that by (the ocean) and multiply the interactions by X billion years. It seems impossible for a symbiosis like this not to have happened. No matter how low the odds are, the counts of those potential interactions bring this outcome to a certainty.
- latchkey 2y agoEach grain of sand on earth represents 1 billion planets in the universe. https://www.reddit.com/r/spaceporn/comments/1af4prs/if_you_wanna_try_wrapping_your_head_around_how/ https://www.reddit.com/r/spaceporn/comments/1af4prs/if_you_w...
- Aloisius 2y agoThere are 100 million times more bacteria in the ocean than there are stars in the universe. Which really should tell people how rare the development of mitochondria was if it has only happened once here.
- ASalazarMX 2y agoIt didn't necessarily happen only once; maybe we were left with the most successful instance.
- rawgabbit 2y agoHere is an animation of the Mitochondria in action. The mitochondria has two cell membranes. The gap in between is called the intermembrane space. It is also positively charged with protons. There are complexes 1-4 which continuously pump protons into this space. The ATP synthase molecule harnesses these protons, similar to a water wheel harnessing the flow of water, to make ATP which is the energy molecule the cell uses. https://youtu.be/LQmTKxI4Wn4?si=i7TpeoV3o_mCWpZF https://youtu.be/LQmTKxI4Wn4?si=i7TpeoV3o_mCWpZF
- jessriedel 2y agoThis article managed to hit two classic science journalism cliches in just the first few paragraphs. (1) “Someone hypothesizing a very dramatic theory with weak evidence was considered wrong by most colleagues but later vindicated when strong evidence emerged”. (No mention of thousands of other dramatic hypotheses that turned out wrong.) (2) “You may have heard in unsophisticated popularization that [philosophical claim ultimately hinging on semantic distinction] was false, but really it’s true [assuming my preferred semantics]”. Aren't we all tired of this yet? Aren’t science journalists embarrassed by this stuff?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- asveikau 2y agoFor #1, I disagree with how you assess this. Firstly, the one who makes the logical fallacy inference that this implies all or most dramatic hypotheses are true is ... You. Not the author of the article. The author of the article is only talking about one specific theory. If I tell you a story about a chicken crossing the road, I'm not obligated to tell you about all the chickens who don't cross any roads. Second, there are plenty of examples of established theories that started this way, and so it is important that scientists consider controversial hypotheses with an open mind. Speaking in any context, it's very easy to dismiss evidence that contradicts your views prematurely. It's sort of a defense mechanism we all do. It's important to recognize such a bias and be willing to acknowledge where your own theory could fall short when you see it.
- jessriedel 2y agoMy point isn’t that these can’t be interpreted correctly, it’s that these framings teach us nothing new because they have been repeated a thousand million times and this article does not attempt to go beyond the superficial cliche.
- liyamchitayat 2y agoHi! for point 2# I had many debates about this with Prof. that are cell biologists, and if you google "Are mitochondria alive," the answer Gemini will give you is no. This is very controversial in my academic circles, but I appreciate your thoughts!
- robwwilliams 2y agoWonerful! This article is a mind-meld of Humberto Maturana’s work on autopoiesis with almost any of Nick Lane’s deep discussions of bioenergetics e.g., the wonderful book “ Power, Sex and Suicide: Mitochonria and the Meaning of Life” or his equally strong book “Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death” that is focused on the Kreb’s cycle. He brings biochemistry and bioenergetics alive in a way that will impact your thinking. Maturana and Valera gave a brilliant definition of “living” in Autopoiesis and Cognition: The Realization of the Living” (1980). But their writing style will make this a tough read. Terry Winograd write a useful summary if Maturana’s philosophy in his computer science classic “Computers and Cognition”.
- meneton 2y agoThis article is framed as if there is something novel and profound here, but the "aliveness" of mitochondria is simply a matter of how we choose to apply the label "life" - a human linguistic construct that exists independently of the biological phenomena. This is not a new discussion - science has been considering this question for many decades, just as it has with viruses. These all come down to arguments about semantics and don't add anything to the science. Mitochondria are fascinating and there is still a huge amount to learn about them but they are totally dependent on the cell's machinery. Most of their genes, the code for their structure, are in the nuclear DNA. A glaring omission if you are trying to make the case that mitochondria are independently living. My heart can exist independently of me, and be transplanted into other people, but does it mean that it is alive? The implication of the whole article is that there something we have missed. This really isn't the case. Lynn Margulis's endosymbiotic origin of mitochondria was challenged by many, and it did spark a scientific debate - that's how science works. She won the argument comprehensively decades ago and is well established science. There have been many such endosymbiotic events in the history of life - there are subfields of evolutionary biology that study these processes.
- blurbleblurble 2y agoIt's wild to me that today's popular biologists like Michael Levin don't give Lynn Margulis credit in every single podcast/interview.
- freetime2 2y agoCan you elaborate on this comment? What should popular biologists like Michael Levin be saying on every podcast/interview and why? Serious question from someone who is familiar with Lynn Margulis but not Michael Levin.
- liyamchitayat 2y agoHi! I agree with you, which is why I wrote this- but if you google "are mitochondria alive" gemini says it isn't. And yes, the cells in your heart have an effective and potenitial niche! We seem to have many tools to engineer viruses, but few to engineer mitochondria- perhaps considering them as alive could change that!
- lynguist 2y agoI agree completely with all the points made in the article and would double down on the critique of the philosophy of biology as a discipline and science itself: namely that is has historically evolved as a mere system of typologies and that this is so settled in and so sacrosanct that biology is such a superstition with human-made categories a couple hundred years ago and not a real science. We see the exact same things also when discussing what is a species and also completely disregarding the reality of horizontal gene transfers etc in the strict, traditional trees. The models are quite wrong and even reduced wrong. There is this one famous article that shows how traditional biology would go and analyze a transistor radio, namely just label its assumed components! Here is the discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31697757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31697757
- tim333 2y agoI'd been taught mitochondria maybe came from bacteria back in high school 40 years ago but I didn't realise till now that Lynn Margulis also proposed the cell nucleus arose in a similar way. (paper https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC34369/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC34369/)
- w10-1 2y agoKey fact (left out of the article): most of the mitochondria's essential proteins, including those for ATP/energy synthesis, are produced by the host cell from the host cell's DNA. So yes, mitochondria have some DNA and do replicate, but no, their cell is not just an "environment" for them. Also interesting: mitochondria can join (often to rescue one failing due to transcription errors) and be transported to other cells across bridges (to supercharge the recipient, as they want to do now for immune cell therapy).
- bjarlsson 2y ago[dead]
- jibal 2y agoPointless word games.
- TeMPOraL 2y agoRandom thought after reading all the philosophical and semantics tangents in the comments here: A good example of a memetic equivalent of endosymbiosis could be Christianity - Catholicism in particular. Historically, as Christianity spread around the world over the two millenia, it would often adapt and absorb indigenous beliefs and practices of converted populations[0]. Many would die out over time, but some got integrated into the core and exported globally. It's just the right time of year to think about Christmas[1]. Can you imagine Christianity without one of its two core holidays? That makes it probably the closest memetic equivalent of a mitochondria - you can still see in it the distinct outline of an ancient Roman festival that was absorbed early on, but all of its memes live on in Christianity. In our times, the holiday is vital to the overall faith, and itself could not exist independently[2]. -- [0] - I've always been taught that this was intentional slack to make it easier for people to accept a new religion, but nowadays I feel it might have been a fundamentally unavoidable outcome. Maintaining organizational coherence and belief consistency at a scale of a whole continent requires communication and bureaucratic technologies that didn't exist until the last 100-200 years. [1] - Or at least so most shops would have me believe; in western commercial calendar, Christmas starts when Halloween ends. [2] - Well okay, I admit this might be a weak part of the analogy - in the western world, Christmas got commercialized to the point it could likely survive as an independent secular tradition.
- elcritch 2y ago> Historically, as Christianity spread around the world over the two millenia, it would often adapt and absorb indigenous beliefs and practices of converted populations Certainly, in the Eastern Orthodox church it's commonly called "baptizing the culture". The idea was/is to take what is good from a culture and to incorporate it to help people become Christians. Also it's a core part of Christian missionaries to learn the language and translate the scripture, and if needed to create a written form of the language. So I'd agree Christianity has always been a bit of a symbiosis of cultures, analogous as you said to endosymbiosis. It started purely Judaic, incorporated large parts of hellenism, and spread globally and imported more bits. The Jewish and Hellenic pieces aren't completely mixed, sort of similar to a mitochondria actually. Then again it makes sense of a religion with a core belief that God became man and created a symbiosis of the two as their savior.
- kingcon2011 2y ago[dead]
- Vecr 2y agoI thought the Mitochondria Liberation Front was defunct. Are people getting back into this type of linguistic debate? Anyway, uplifting as a whole is pretty sketchy and I'm not sure there's too much point.
- DarkmSparks 2y agoSurely I can't be the only one who read this as midichlorians and thought it was something to do with star wars. Actually feel a little ashamed about that.
- ChainOfFools 2y ago> My heart can exist independently of me, and be transplanted into other people, but does it mean that it is alive? Interesting analogy, made more interesting still if one replaces "heart" with "brain." And what if you reverse mitochondria and host cell? If you remove the mitochondria, is the host cell still alive? The analogy would be to remove the heart from its 'host' environment, and asking if the remaining body still can be called alive. "for a man cut open is, so far, not a man. And if you do not sew him up speedily you will not see organs, but death."
- ConspiracyFact 2y ago“In the early 20th century, Albert Einstein and Claude Shannon laid out the three pillars of the physical world: matter, information, and energy.” I’ve yet to see a convincing argument that information has independent existence. The notion is ontologically absurd on its face.
- TechDebtDevin 2y agoIs this a blog post or... Why does this have 305 comments?
- djaygour 2y agoHey HN, I'm building a payment solution that lets customers buy directly from social media without leaving platforms like Instagram, Facebook, etc. So why do we all need this? There are millions of small and medium businesses and brands that can't establish an online presence, and most of them regularly use social media to post about their products. I want to help these businesses. Instagram and Facebook have shopping features, but only for a few brands, and they are not available in many regions like India. India has the world's second most active social media users and millions of businesses trying to acquire customers using social media. I want users and buyers to be able to shop directly from posts without leaving the app. I want my payment model on these platforms to create more convenience for customers and reduce business costs. So, if someone who has worked at Facebook, Instagram, or any other company has valuable advice for me, please share. How can I make this happen? Will these platforms allow me to? Thank you
- gcanyon 2y agoThis feels a lot like the debate about whether Pluto is a planet: what we're really trying to figure out here is whether we can figure out a definition for a concept that includes all the things we think should be included, and excludes all the things we think should be excluded -- and the meta conversation is: can we all agree on what should be included/excluded? That's a bit of a dance, since a cleaner and simpler definition can swing people's opinion about inclusion/exclusion, so the influence goes both ways.
- Kalanos 2y agoConsider that there are thousands of mitochondria (MT) in an individual muscle cell. Cell diagrams often make it look like there is one MT organelle. It's highly misleading. Single cell bacteria have thousands of genes. MT have a few dozen genes. Many of the genes that regulate MT are contained in the cell's nucleus.
- ambyra 2y agoToday I learned that mitochondria are the only organelles that replicate “on their own” inside a cell, while the other organelles just bud off the preexisting ones. I wonder how they are signaled to do so though. Reminds me of sea slugs that eat plants and then integrate their chloroplasts to produce energy, or my dad who kept swapping the same Honda motor through all our go karts because it was too good to get rid of.
- merryocha 2y agoIf you want a fun scifi horror novel to read related to this topic, check out Parasite Eve by Hideaki Sena. It's the novel that inspired the PSX game. The whole plot revolves around mitochondria and was inspired by the author's time as a grad student. I read it a few months ago and really enjoyed it.
- devoutsalsa 2y agoI once asked a biologist “using today’s understanding, what is life?” She answered with ”the more we learn, the more I ask myself what is biology?”
- gjs4786 2y agoOkay, what about the Earth? If mitochondria are alive, you must also consider the Earth as being alive too. Personally, I think it's a simple answer. Here's my positively b reasoning on the topic for anyone daring enough. It can be a very blurred line, but much of that is our shadow. Mitichondria are more alive than they are dead. Simply because they exist as potential and can go on and are intended for this, for lack of better words. Where as a rock will not come alive, no matter the conditions. We hope. Maybe we should think of it like we do for other forms of energy and how I be thought we did think of it already but was of biochemical energy expressions. Along with kinetic energy, potential energy, chemical energy. Surely there is a number determined for the maximum lifetime energy output potential (work) of a single mitochondrion. While it is plain and simple, that's just life for you
- gjs4786 2y agoOkay, what about the Earth? If mitochondria are alive, you must also consider the Earth as being alive too. Personally, I think it's a simple answer. Here's my reasoning on the topic for anyone daring enough. It can be a very blurred line, but much of that is our shadow. Mitichondria are more alive than they are dead. Simply because they exist as potential and can go on and are intended for this, for lack of better words. Where as a rock will not come alive, no matter the conditions. We hope. Maybe we should think of it like we do for other forms of energy and how I be thought we did think of it already as biochemical energy expressions. Along with kinetic energy, potential energy, chemical energy. Surely there is a number determined for the maximum lifetime energy output potential (work) of a single mitochondrion. While it is plain and simple, that's just life for you.
- realo 2y agoWake me up the day we find a new earth, a baby earth right by us and the moon...
- syllablehq 2y ago"Molecular biologists tend to focus on characteristics like metabolism, growth and development, response to stimuli, reproduction, and the ability to process information or evolve." Even if you stretch the others real hard, I don't see how you'd argue that the Earth "reproduces." Especially not the more rigorous definition of reproduces fertile copies of itself which can evolve.
- science4sail 2y agoOn an ecosystem (not geological) level, one could argue that space colonization is reproduction and that spaceships are the ecosystem's spores.
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