Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Few days ago it has been published a paper in the format of new scientific theory in "Frontiers in Molecular biosciences", entitled "Elements of the cellular metabolic structure", in which the main finding is the discovery of a new biochemical system (the CMS) with the capacity to store molecular information.
According to this published dualistic theory of the cell hereditary information, cells exhibit two systems capable of storing molecular information, a dynamic, flexible and adaptive system: the CMS (metabolic memory), and an essentially conservative structural system: the DNA (genetic memory).
The original paper is:
De la Fuente IM (2015) Elements of the cellular metabolic structure. Front. Mol. Biosci. 2:16. doi: 10.3389/fmolb.2015.00016
The link:
Moderator cut: Please read our tos and wait with posting links and/or recommendations until you have at least 10 posts.
Scientific revolution? What do you mean exactly? The article handles large amounts of data. It was very interesting for me the part about the cell information processing; even such a definition “metabolic memory” is impressive, but confusing at the same time.
So, you share this view on “metabolic memory” as the part of hereditary information of the same importance as DNA. Could you explain shortly the mechanism?
well the metabolic memory is very complex, it is based on the emergence of Hopfield-like dynamics. These dynamics are defined by the presence of several binary nodes that can be activated together. Once the network receives an input stimuli, it's activity falls into the one with the least possible energy. As the several nodes of the network get activated together they begin forming a stronger bond (Hebbian learning), this property allows the capacity of the network to recall past activity with partial stimuli. However, this kind of memory depends on the network beign permanently active (which is very uncommon in biology), so the phospho-forms of proteins act as a stabilized form of metabolic memory which requires far less energy.
This kind of memory is potentially heritable by daughter cells, but in the case of multicellular organisms the mechanisms are mostly unknown, with the exception of epigenetics which is currently beign studied.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
