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Different From Everything We've Encountered Before

Started by Recusant, November 16, 2018, 06:28:51 PM

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Recusant

If confirmed, this is an amazing discovery. A microscopic life form, the ancestors of which split off from others approximately a billion years ago. It had been observed previously, but this is the first time its genetic material has been analyzed to determine its evolutionary relation with other life forms.

There are a few different articles on this (here and here for instance) but the best one I've found is from the CBC:

"Rare microbes lead scientists to discover new branch on the tree of life" | CBC

Quote

This is an electron microscope image of Hemimastix kukwesjijk, named after Kukwes, a greedy, hairy ogre from Mi'kmaq mythology. Its 'mouth' or capitulum is on the left. Image Credit: Yana Eglit





Canadian researchers have discovered a new kind of organism that's so different from other living things that it doesn't fit into the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, or any other kingdom used to classify known organisms.

Two species of the microscopic organisms, called hemimastigotes, were found in dirt collected on a whim during a hike in Nova Scotia by Dalhousie University graduate student Yana Eglit.

A genetic analysis shows they're more different from other organisms than animals and fungi (which are in different kingdoms) are from each other, representing a completely new part of the tree of life, Eglit and her colleagues report this week in the journal Nature.

"They represent a major branch... that we didn't know we were missing," said Dalhousie biology professor Alastair Simpson, Eglit's supervisor and co-author of the new study.

"There's nothing we know that's closely related to them."

In fact, he estimates you'd have to go back a billion years — about 500 million years before the first animals arose — before you could find a common ancestor of hemimastigotes and any other known living things.

[. . .]

Hemimastigotes were first seen and described in the 19th century. But at that time, no one could figure out how they fit into the evolutionary tree of life. Consequently, they've been "a tantalizing mystery" to microbiologists for quite a long time, Eglit said.

Like animals, plants, fungi and ameobas — but unlike bacteria — hemimastigotes have complex cells with mini-organs called organelles, making them part of the "domain" of organisms called eukaryotes rather than bacteria or archaea.

About 10 species of hemimastigotes have been described over more than 100 years. But up until now, no one had been able to do a genetic analysis to see how they were related to other living things.

[Continues . . .]

Abstract of the paper in Nature:

QuoteAlmost all eukaryote life forms have now been placed within one of five to eight supra-kingdom-level groups using molecular phylogenetics. The 'phylum' Hemimastigophora is probably the most distinctive morphologically defined lineage that still awaits such a phylogenetic assignment. First observed in the nineteenth century, hemimastigotes are free-living predatory protists with two rows of flagella and a unique cell architecture; to our knowledge, no molecular sequence data or cultures are currently available for this group.

Here we report phylogenomic analyses based on high-coverage, cultivation-independent transcriptomics that place Hemimastigophora outside of all established eukaryote supergroups. They instead comprise an independent supra-kingdom-level lineage that most likely forms a sister clade to the 'Diaphoretickes' half of eukaryote diversity (that is, the 'stramenopiles, alveolates and Rhizaria' supergroup (Sar), Archaeplastida and Cryptista, as well as other major groups).

The previous ranking of Hemimastigophora as a phylum understates the evolutionary distinctiveness of this group, which has considerable importance for investigations into the deep-level evolutionary history of eukaryotic life—ranging from understanding the origins of fundamental cell systems to placing the root of the tree. We have also established the first culture of a hemimastigote (Hemimastix kukwesjijk sp. nov.), which will facilitate future genomic and cell-biological investigations into eukaryote evolution and the last eukaryotic common ancestor.
"Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration — courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and above all, love of the truth."
— H. L. Mencken


Tank

If religions were TV channels atheism is turning the TV off.
"Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt." ― Richard P. Feynman
'It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it's called Life.' - Terry Pratchett
Remember, your inability to grasp science is not a valid argument against it.

No one

Tank:
One wonders what else is out there to find?

Maybe even creatards with actual functioning thinking units.

xSilverPhinx

I am what survives if it's slain - Zack Hemsey


Tank

Quote from: No one on November 16, 2018, 07:36:48 PM
Tank:
One wonders what else is out there to find?

Maybe even creatards with actual functioning thinking units.

If their brains functioned they wouldn't be creotards would they?
If religions were TV channels atheism is turning the TV off.
"Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt." ― Richard P. Feynman
'It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it's called Life.' - Terry Pratchett
Remember, your inability to grasp science is not a valid argument against it.

Essie Mae

Another (amazing) piece of evidence to support the theory of evolution.
Hell is empty and all the devils are here. Wm Shakespeare


Icarus

Sadly beyond the ken of our creationists brethren.