Sea Cucumbers Can Puke Up Their Guts and Grow New Ones, and Scientists Are Figuring Out How

never threaten a sea cucumber—it may poop out its guts on you. Sea cucumbers, members of the class Holothuroidea, are wyrd animals. They are n’t related to cucumbers, which are plants. The invertebrate marine animals are echinoderms, like starfish and sea urchins. Unlike those animals though, which by and large have hardened calcium exoskeletons, ocean cucumbers are soft and spongy. There are several species, which look like colorful, sometimes bristly, logs. One peculiarly strange adaptation is their ability to eject their viscera when they feel threatened. even more bizarre is that they can regrow their intestines within a couple of weeks. New research aims to use genetics to understand how they are able to do this, and whether this can affect the future of regenerative music. however, the primary coil focus of the inquiry is to better understand the animals that are bred for human pulmonary tuberculosis.

Scientists at the Institute of Oceanography and the taiwanese Academy of Sciences have now sequenced most of the genome of one species of sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus. The study, published today in PLOS Biology, fills in some gaps in their celebrated past. Sea cucumbers, the analysis shows, must have evolutionarily split off from their cousins, the ocean stars and urchins, about 479 million years ago. They have fewer genes for biomineralization, or creating bony structures, and those genes are less carry than in other echinoderms. Animals may contain genes for a characteristic, but if it ‘s not expressed, or expressed less, then they may not show that feature in their phenotype.

furthermore, two sets of genes could account for their amaze regenerative abilities. One set of genes was duplicated in A. japonicus, but not in early echinoderms, suggesting that sea cucumbers owe some of their singularity to these genes. They were besides highly expressed specifically in the regenerating intestines of the animals, meaning that they have an important function in that area. The other hardening of genes were besides activated during positive feedback.

The potential benefits of this inquiry are double. First, it can help us understand an animal that sells. A. japonicus, which is bred in commercial fisheries, is popular in markets for sale for its suspected aesculapian benefits, and for sale as food. chinese dishes sometimes include sea cucumbers, either dried, chopped, drizzled in sauce, or french-fry. second, understanding the animal ‘s ability to re-grow body parts, a superintendent power evocative of Marvel ‘s Wolverine, could shed abstemious on regenerative medicine and ultimately help human curative. The science is a farseeing means from having hardheaded medical implications, though, so do n’t go expelling your guts just yet .

source : http://heyreviewfood.com
Category : CHINESE FOOD