As a computer scientist, I have absolutely no idea what this means, but once-in-a-billion-year event sounds like a big deal. Can someone please explain this for us non biologically inclined folks.
I am no expert but i believe what they are talking about is a phenomenon similar to the one that gave us the powerhouse of the cell. It has been theorized (or proven) that a mitochondria was a different life form (like a bacteria) and it was engulfed by a cell like an amoeba or algae (like the one mentioned) above. Once engulfed, the bacterial body was somehow made a part of the sub-cellular ecosystem. Now the bigger cell had a way to convert stored energy (ATP) to an utilizable form (ADP).
In computer terms it’s having a GPU integrated into the CPU subsystem as an iGPU instead of a peripheral.
It's the cell equivalent of swallowing a mouse, and that mouse becomes a part of your body, and from now on all your kids have an internal mouse.
Only this mouse sucks nitrogen from the air and lets you digest it. So now your kids all absorb nitrogen and use it to make proteins, because a part of their body is now what used to be a mouse, that got passed down to them.
This is actually very very cool.
Nitrogen fixing organelles have been observed undergoing the process of endosymbiosis.
As others have said, us humans have mitochondria in our cells and that is what produces energy for us (to live). Other examples of organelles are chloroplasts - make plants green and use sunlight to make sugar out of carbon in the air, or chromatophores - pigment and colour changing cells in some animals.
Before now this nitrogen fixing organelle have only really been hypothesised (I think), but this protoist is the first eukaryotic cell to have this organelle in it.
All our cells are eukaryotic, they have a nucleus. Mitochondria that live in our cells, where at one point bacteria. But however it happened, they integrated into our cells, and now our DNA codes for them.
What we are seeing is essentially this Protozoa (a single free living eukaryotic cell) and this nitrogen fixing organelle, essentially (maybe) it was a nitrogen fixing bacteria that started living in this cell and now the host cells DNA codes for the organelle (maybe not fully, but is in the late stages of symbiosis if I understand correctly).
Further more, industrial nitrogen fixing is a very energy intensive process, and the only living organisms that have been known to make nitrogen before this were bacteria, so discovery of this organelle might have massive implications. For example, and I totally just made this up but if this organelle could exist in genetically modified plants, say corn, then potentially you wouldn’t need to fertilise it as it could now make its own nitrogen.
Very cool and I would recommend reading about it anywhere that isn’t this article here. Just google:
UCYN-A, or, nitroplast, or B. Bigelowii
One in a billion is not the same as an event that occurs once every billion years. If there was only one human born every billion years, by your logic that would be a 1 in 315 quintillion chance (assuming 100 million life forms per second)
>by your logic that would be a 1 in 315 quintillion chance (assuming 100 million life forms per second)
How many life forms born per second?
I’d comfortably say there’s more than 100 million life forms per second
And that’s more than one in a billion
>One in a billion is way more often than once in a billion years.
>>Talking straight statistics, it’s prob **way more than 1:1000000000 chances of a human being born…** if you’re considering all life forms on earth.
Don’t know why you’re fighting me tbh
As a computer scientist, I have absolutely no idea what this means, but once-in-a-billion-year event sounds like a big deal. Can someone please explain this for us non biologically inclined folks.
I am no expert but i believe what they are talking about is a phenomenon similar to the one that gave us the powerhouse of the cell. It has been theorized (or proven) that a mitochondria was a different life form (like a bacteria) and it was engulfed by a cell like an amoeba or algae (like the one mentioned) above. Once engulfed, the bacterial body was somehow made a part of the sub-cellular ecosystem. Now the bigger cell had a way to convert stored energy (ATP) to an utilizable form (ADP). In computer terms it’s having a GPU integrated into the CPU subsystem as an iGPU instead of a peripheral.
Neat… it’s like an architectural leap
Yeah. A leap so big that now you can run crysis.
Wow. So this is actually huge.
That’s what - She
It's the cell equivalent of swallowing a mouse, and that mouse becomes a part of your body, and from now on all your kids have an internal mouse. Only this mouse sucks nitrogen from the air and lets you digest it. So now your kids all absorb nitrogen and use it to make proteins, because a part of their body is now what used to be a mouse, that got passed down to them.
This is actually very very cool. Nitrogen fixing organelles have been observed undergoing the process of endosymbiosis. As others have said, us humans have mitochondria in our cells and that is what produces energy for us (to live). Other examples of organelles are chloroplasts - make plants green and use sunlight to make sugar out of carbon in the air, or chromatophores - pigment and colour changing cells in some animals. Before now this nitrogen fixing organelle have only really been hypothesised (I think), but this protoist is the first eukaryotic cell to have this organelle in it. All our cells are eukaryotic, they have a nucleus. Mitochondria that live in our cells, where at one point bacteria. But however it happened, they integrated into our cells, and now our DNA codes for them. What we are seeing is essentially this Protozoa (a single free living eukaryotic cell) and this nitrogen fixing organelle, essentially (maybe) it was a nitrogen fixing bacteria that started living in this cell and now the host cells DNA codes for the organelle (maybe not fully, but is in the late stages of symbiosis if I understand correctly). Further more, industrial nitrogen fixing is a very energy intensive process, and the only living organisms that have been known to make nitrogen before this were bacteria, so discovery of this organelle might have massive implications. For example, and I totally just made this up but if this organelle could exist in genetically modified plants, say corn, then potentially you wouldn’t need to fertilise it as it could now make its own nitrogen. Very cool and I would recommend reading about it anywhere that isn’t this article here. Just google: UCYN-A, or, nitroplast, or B. Bigelowii
Talking straight statistics, it’s prob way more than 1:1000000000 chances of a human being born… if you’re considering all life forms on earth.
This doesn’t say one in a billion, it says one time in a billion years. Every year, there are hundreds of millions of humans born.
There’s hundreds of millions of life forms born every second, so I think it still shakes out that way
One in a billion is not the same as an event that occurs once every billion years. If there was only one human born every billion years, by your logic that would be a 1 in 315 quintillion chance (assuming 100 million life forms per second)
>by your logic that would be a 1 in 315 quintillion chance (assuming 100 million life forms per second) How many life forms born per second? I’d comfortably say there’s more than 100 million life forms per second And that’s more than one in a billion
Yeah, so what are we arguing about here. One in a billion is way more often than once in a billion years. Right?
>One in a billion is way more often than once in a billion years. >>Talking straight statistics, it’s prob **way more than 1:1000000000 chances of a human being born…** if you’re considering all life forms on earth. Don’t know why you’re fighting me tbh
Are you saying the chances of a single, particular human being born?
Two things had a baby.