Early during the First World War contact or connectivity between command and front-line forces was primitive compared to today’s inter-connected world. Messages were passed up and down the chain of command by a variety of means. Remember the midnight ride of Paul Revere, ‘Of the North church tower as a signal light, one if by land, and two if by sea…
The human brain deos icnredbile tihgns taht we di not have all hte awnsres to. Raegdin taht perivuos scnetnce is proof taht we are more cbaplabe tahn waht we bieleive. So, how era we sitl albe to raed tehse wrods wehn tehy go angaist erevyhting we have bene tughat auobt how to raed?
So messages when they did get through often had to go through multiple sources. Passing down information became subject to human distortions and meanings and sounds of words became confused as exemplified by the following amusing parody. (I’ve added a few amusing constructs to illustrate the challenges inherent in passing along a message.)
Original Message ‘Send reinforcements, we’re going to advance.’ Somewhere in the chain of communication, this gets distorted to:–
‘Don’t send reinforcements we’re not going to advance.’
‘Send no reinforcements we’re not going to advance.’
‘Send some reinforcements we might not advance.’
‘Send some refreshments we’re thinking of a dance.’
‘Send more refreshments we’re all in a trance.’
‘Send three -and-four pence, we’re going to a dance.’
It happens so easily in everyday life. A word added here, or dropped there, can alter the entire context of the message.
Now imagine something vastly more complex. A communication mechanism of information with profound consequences which underwrite our physical existence; – the human DNA mechanism.
Imagine what would be the outcome if our biological process got its signals and messaging mixed up like this.? Complex organic structures embedded with information, billions of chemical signalling transcribing the coded identity of who we are, all encapsulated in DNA genomic maps. Think of the trillions of genes operating and transposed from generation to generation passing information downthe line attributes of physical and mental characteristics. Starting with our unique building blocks –our DNA holds information about everything it means to be human. Its role, in very simplistic terms is, – Transcription, it holds the genetic blueprint material the building blocks of who we are and what we become. RNA is about Translation and transferring information into Protein sequences. Anyone ever examining genetic diagrams will so see what staggering processes take place. The core information from chromosome pairs to peptide chains and protein folding structures is nothing short of miraculous. Passing on information is one thing; information storage is even more mind- boggling when it comes to molecular science.
The smallest known genome of any free-living organism contains 482 genes comprising 580,000 base pairs. There is enough information capacity in a single human cell to storethe Encyclopaedia Britannica, all 30 volumes of it – 3 to 4 times over. To illustrate further the amount of information that could be stored in a pinheads volume of DNA is the equivalent of the information content in a pile of paperback books 500 times as tall as the distance from the Earth to the Moon. The prospect of mis-messaging information such as outlined earlier in “Send reinforcements…” taking place in the entire human genome, would be too awful to contemplate.
The beauty and wonder of this information carrying DNA molecule when one considers its amazing properties. Being the blueprint of all living things it stores all the information necessary for the cell to feed and protect itself as well as propagate itself into more living cells and cooperate with other living cells that make up a complex organism.
If the DNA of one human cell were unravelled and held in a straight line it would literally be almost one-metre and yet be so thin it would be invisible to all but the most powerful microscope. If you uncoiled your entire DNA, it would stretch 67 billion miles –or 150,000 round trips to the Moon. The process of converting DNA information into proteins requires at 75 different protein molecules. But each and every one of these 75 proteins must be synthesised in the first place by the very process in which they were involved. The flow of information needs to be utterly flawless in every step of the way.
Fascinating, as all this may sound, even more intriguing is the branch of molecular genetics called Epigenetics, a new and emerging branch of genetics that tries to understand how the environment can influence or suppress certain genetic markers within the blueprint DNA. Traditional thinking postulated that our DNA and its gene sequencing ordained our human characteristics. Tall, short blue eyes, blond hair, extrovert etc. Some early research indicates that environmental factors play a part in altering or editing which genes become more influential based on nurturing factors. Identical twins for example with similar DNA characteristics often exhibit distinctly different attributes, and some studies are suggestive that certain early life experiences for good or bad can suppress a particular genomic expression from taking place giving rise to the nurture versus nature debate. These biomarkers respond and dictate the degree our DNA blueprint gets expressed. These chemical modifications define how information gets passed on influencing changes to how our entire physiology gets expressed without altering our DNA. Information transmission becomes scripted and in that sense takes on a more profound dimension.
Any two people -99.6% of their DNA is identical. The 0.4% variation represents 12 million base pairs which accounts for the entire individuality of the human race.
Information Transmission –the Building Blocks
Recombinant DNA | Hybrid DNA is produced in the laboratory by joining pieces of DNA from different sources.
Replication | The process by which DNA copies itself in order to make a new genome to pass on to a daughter cell.
Ribosome | The cell structure in which proteins are manufactured. Most cells contain thousands of ribosomes.
RNA | Abbreviation for ribonucleic acid, the molecule that carries out DNA’s instructions for making proteins. It consists of one long chain made up of nucleotides. Each nucleotide contains one base, one phosphate molecule and the sugar molecule ribose. The bases in RNA nucleotides are adenine, uracil, guanine and cytosine.
RNA interference (RNAi) | A gene silencing process in which double-stranded RNAs trigger the destruction of specific RNAs.
RNA polymerase | an enzyme that transcribes a DNA sequence, creating mRNA.
RNA splicing| the process by which introns become removed and exons are joined together from an RNA transcript to produce an mRNA molecule.
Sequencing | Sometimes called DNA sequencing or gene sequencing. Discovering the exact order of the building blocks (see nucleotides) of a particular piece of DNA.
Stem Cell | A cell that can develop into many different cell types in the body.
Systems biology | A field that seeks to study the relationships and interactions between various parts of a biological system (metabolic pathways, organelles, cells and organisms) and to integrate this information to understand how biological systems function.
Telomere | A repeated DNA sequence that caps the ends of chromosomes.
Transcription | the first major step in gene expression, in which the information coded in DNA is copied into a molecule of RNA.
Translation | The second major step in gene expression, in which the instructions encoded in RNA are carried out by making a protein or starting or stopping protein synthesis.
Variant | A different version of a gene, one that has a slightly different sequence of nucleotide
Each of these processes is part of a mechanism to deliver genetic information between the two worlds of amino acids and protein peptide chains contained within the double helix DNA chain.
The Human Genome Project completed in 2003 clarified the role that certain gene sequences played in diseases, including breast cancer and muscular dystrophy. However, it also revealed that only 2% of the genome actually encodes instructions for protean synthesis, and the role of the remaining DNA remains a complete mystery.
So much for passing on Information!
“It is a very sad thing that nowadays there is so little useless information.” – Oscar Wilde
‘Wouldn’t now be a good time to be grateful for tomorrow?’
Martin Jeremiah
