Thursday, July 11, 2019
A new sense? Not exactly
Via ScienceDaily, an excellent piece of pure Carver.
Back in the lab, the group studied wild samples of Spirostomum while also growing their own cultures of Spirostomum ambiguum, and began a deep dive into details of this ultra-fast contraction. Using high-speed imaging, they found it happens in 5 milliseconds -- the human eye takes 100-400 milliseconds to blink -- and that the cell endures about 14 times the force of gravity in the process. As it shrinks, pouches of toxin break off from the cell's edges and release their contents into the surrounding fluid. During one late night in the lab, the researchers also noticed that, when in clumps, the cells seemed to all contract at the same time.Well, that's not really ultrafast. Cochlear hair cells can do 120 microseconds. The communication is more interesting.
The first cell contracts and generates a flow, which triggers the second and that one triggers the third. So, you get this propagating trigger wave that passes through the whole colony..... a specific amount of bodily tension likely causes the opening or closing of tension gated ion channels within S. ambiguum, making it contract.The fast motion moves the surrounding water, and the moving water opens ion gates, triggering a synapse-like response. Well, that's not really a new sense. Baroreceptor neurons in blood vessels work the same way. The MOST interesting part is the PARALLEL PURPOSE between these cells and baroreceptors. A technique used for fight AND flight by the free-living cell serves as part of the same (more complex) reaction in more complex creatures. Same gene? Wouldn't be surprised. LIFE IS PURPOSE.
Labels: Carver, Grand Blueprint
¶ 11:59 PM
