Timeline for Would a genetically-inserted “memory” be present in all neurons? Or just specific neurons?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
12 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jun 29, 2023 at 23:30 | comment | added | AlexP | @inkwell87: We don't know how it worked. We only know that it worked. More research is needed. | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 23:19 | comment | added | maisaur | I see, so then bringing this back to the worldbuilding matter at hand, does that mean it’s back to square one for figuring out a mechanism to instill a certain behavior a la the slug experiment without forming extraneous pathways due to affecting too many cells? (I’m not the most versed in reading academic papers but from what I can see the trained RNA was entered into untrained slugs just via bloodstream, making me think there was no “outside” targeting done. Did the RNA in that case have a level of regulation deciding not just which cell type but even which individual neurons are affected?) | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 21:57 | comment | added | Nosajimiki | @AlexP Exactly, and that is the difference between an instinctive fear and an epigenetic fear. Both are complex, automatic, genetic responses to a stimulus, but one kind only expresses based the experiences of your parent. | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 21:43 | comment | added | AlexP | @inkwell87: In general, think of the genetic code + epigenetic modifications as a recipe to build an organism and to keep it working once built. The genetic code does not and cannot encode the fully formed organism. (One good example is the high variability of the human circulatory system; the textbook network of arteries and veins exists only in textbooks. Almost all humans have at least one large-ish blood vessel in a non-textbook position or relationship, and the small vessels are basically random.) | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 21:37 | comment | added | AlexP | @inkwell87: The best bet at the current level of knowledge (where current means some 30 years ago when I was young and reading such things) is that the regulatory mechanism affects development and does not work on adult animals; this is why evo-devo is such a big thing. But if you figure that out there are multiple Nobel prizes in biology to be awarded. | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 21:12 | comment | added | maisaur | So if I’m doing this with a purely epigenetic technique, essentially just changing the pattern/levels of certain genes’ expression across different neurons to form a new brain behavior (I can’t insert any new genetic material into the host’s DNA basically), how would I be able to include regulatory mechanisms for these effects if they were to be induced into EVERY neuron? Is there a “genetic signature” my substance can use to figure out which cells receive the changes and which don’t, or does it have to be implemented further back on the level of which cells the substance does or doesnt enter? | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 20:05 | comment | added | AlexP | @Nosajimiki: Humans have a built-in instinct of fear of snakes, and most of us have not been raised in the presence of snakes. | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 19:49 | comment | added | Nosajimiki | I read a while back that, if you raise mice in the presence of cats, then the children will have an automatic fear response to cats that you don't see from children of mice not raised around cats... so it seem that epigenetic memory can actually be relatively complex. | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 19:42 | history | edited | AlexP | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jun 29, 2023 at 19:40 | comment | added | AlexP | @inkwell87: What was actually transmitted in the experiment was neither a memory nor an instinct, but only a conditioned reflex. Instincts are much more complex than that; but the importance of the experiment is that it hints at a possible basis for the transmission of instincts. As they always say, more research is needed. | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 19:27 | comment | added | maisaur | Maybe “instincts” carries too specific a connotation to use there; when I say “memory” and “instinct” I’m using them both in a way similar to the linked paper’s experiment, where it refers to a response to a particular stimulus (in that case called a “memory” because it was trained into one group of slugs to react a certain way, then transferred to a group that never experienced that training) | |
| Jun 29, 2023 at 19:15 | history | answered | AlexP | CC BY-SA 4.0 |