Senin, 30 April 2012

Man's remotest relative and one of the world's oldest organisms found

Man's remotest relative and one of the world's oldest organisms found

  • Creature is 'new category' of organism
  • Evolved about a billion years ago
  • Microscopic creature in lake in Norway, eats algae

By Ruth Whitehead

PUBLISHED: 11:19 EST, 28 April 2012 | UPDATED: 08:47 EST, 30 April 2012


Scientists say they have found one of the world's oldest living organisms and man's remotest relative - after spending two decades examining a microscopic algae-eater that lives in a lake in Norway.

They have even had to invent a new category of organism for it called Collodictyon because it is not an animal, plant, parasite, fungus or alga, they said. 

They said the elusive, single-cell creature evolved about a billion years ago. 

Spot the family resemblance? The newly identified collodictyon is closer to human beings than to bacteria, according to the Norwegian scientists

Spot the family resemblance? The newly identified collodictyon is closer to human beings than to bacteria, according to the Norwegian scientists

"We have found an unknown branch of the tree of life that lives in this lake. It is unique!" University of Oslo researcher Kamran Shalchian-Tabrizi said.

"So far we know of no other group of organisms that descends from closer to the roots of the tree of life than this species."

Scientists believe the discovery may provide insight into what life looked like on earth hundreds of millions of years ago.

Collodictyon lives in the sludge of a small lake called Ã…s, 30 kilometres south of Oslo.

Glorious mud: the find that scientists said was 'unique' was made in the sludge of a lake south of Oslo

Glorious mud: the find that scientists said was 'unique' was made in the sludge of a lake south of Oslo

It has four tail-like propellers it uses to move around called flagella, and at 30 to 50 micrometres (millionths of a metre) long it can only be seen with a microscope.

Collodictyon possess cell nuclei enclosed by membranes, which makes them less like bacteria and more like eukaryotes, that is, plants, fungi, algae and animals, including humans.

Using the characteristics of collodictyon, Dr Tabrizi said scientists inferred that prehistoric eukaryotes were probably a single-cell organism with finger-like structures that it used to catch microscopic prey.

"They are not sociable creatures," added co-researcher Dag Klaveness, who bred millions of the tiny organisms for the study.

"They flourish best alone. Once they have eaten the food, cannibalism is the order of the day."

They have not been found anywhere but in Lake Ã…s.

"It is quite fascinating that we can still find these kinds of organisms after so many years," Tabrizi told AFP.

"It has been outside our living rooms for millions of years and we haven't seen it."

Collodictyon was first found in the lake about 20 years ago by University of Oslo scientists who recognised it was unusual but "didn't know how important it was", he added.

 

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There is nothing in the proven parts of the Theory of Evolution, that suggest the apparent appearance of intelligence at work is purely illusory. So I wish people with an Atheist agenda would stop using it as evidence for their beliefs. The idea that 'chance mutations' and 'survival of the fittest' explains everything, really is just an opinion. Intelligent Design is just as valid an opinion. Even without the evidence of masses of Neo-Revelations and channeled works, that tell us it was 'overcontrolled' or 'quickened from seed' over millions of years, by the power of God. Even Alfred Russel Wallace was a Spiritualist. It is interesting but ultimately irrelivant, how our bodies were created, we are Ascending Spirits and it is where we are going that truly matters.

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Michael @ 12:03 Now you add mis-characterization to your offensive accusations. The evident fact you persist in oblique personal attack against me, and any parent who teaches their children about a Creator (to think for themselves), rather than believe the pseudo-science claim that man is descended from a chest-thumbing anthropoid beast, or kin to a bacteria-like organism resident in sludge--labeling it "child abuse"(!)--says volumes about you (and those who gave you a hardy "thumbs up"). You honestly expect me to debate you in lines of such an attitude? Repeatedly, you have charged me, if only by implication, as being a lier! Is that your manner of debate--to imply the contrary party is a lier? Familiar tone of reaction, that your personally-directed remarks typify, reveals something about. And be sure, its not flattering. For all your self-confident statements, hints of insecurity in your declaration of "faith"--defended through lunging character-ass ault--may be showing.

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Are you decended from Collodictyon on your Mother's side or your father's Side of the Family ? ( tee-he-he )

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We all come from, "sludge". Really! And I was lead to believe we all came form "Apes". This is very confusing! What do I tell my kids now? They're relatives of sludge! And Irish sludge, at that. They're going to think I've lost it. Just like these researchers. - Frank Rodgers, Pembroke, On. Can., Clearly if you have five year old kids or older they're going to have long passed your knowledge and understanding of evolution, maybe you need to get an education so that you can pass on some knowledge? Just a theory.

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But you ought not resort to false accusations of criminal indictment against any who refuse to bow-down at the altar of atheism's secular dogma, to worship in its Temple of pseudo-science, and, instead, teach their children that they were Created--by design, for purpose. That their lives have meaning, and a future. That they are not mere thinking animals, with ancestral descent from the primeval brute. - resident, somewhere in America, 30/4/2012 03:35 Your bible also teaches that the world is a flat circle fixed in space around which the sun revolves, how do you explain to your children how their ancestors travelled by ship to America...without falling over the edge of the earth?

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Who said that its unlikely that Loch Ness can hold a plesiosaurus for a mere 60 mill years?

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But you ought not resort to false accusations of criminal indictment against any who refuse to bow-down at the altar of atheism's secular dogma, to worship in its Temple of pseudo-science, and, instead, teach their children that they were Created--by design, for purpose. That their lives have meaning, and a future. That they are not mere thinking animals, with ancestral descent from the primeval brute. - Rene' ( Creation's Imprint vs. Evolution's Declaration ), USA, 30/4/2012 10:10 ========== As I said, lying to your children to prop up your own arcane beliefs in the supernatural. If you're going to claim that we are all created by supernatural forces you need to provide some evidence. If you are going to claim evolution doesn't happen you need to explain why the evidence (masses of it) is wrong. The fact that you regard it as a disaster that we aren't God's special creation says more about you and your ego than you may realise.

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:::::: It's a billion years old (probably according to carbon dating) :::::: For dating very old specimens (yes, even older than Monty Burns' mother) they can't use carbon dating. The age of the rock, for example, containing the specimen can be determined by other methods, like paleomagnetism or cyrstallisation that could only have happened at certain times in the Earth's past - Go Einstein, Auckland NZ, 29/4/2012 12:31 Carbon dating isn't needed as it is "one of the world's oldest LIVING organisms" it actually "evolved about a billion years ago".

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Michael @ 11:43 -- "Scientists say they have found one of the world's oldest living organisms and man's remotest relative" / "We have found an unknown branch of the tree of life..." / "So far we know of no other group of organisms that descends from closer to the roots of the tree of life than this species." / ~~~ You are free to believe "Evolution happens", is observable, and that your distant relative is just outside your living room in the dirt, "collodictyon [ which ] is closer to human beings than bacteria", and which resort to "cannibalism", if you so choose. But you ought not resort to false accusations of criminal indictment against any who refuse to bow-down at the altar of atheism's secular dogma, to worship in its Temple of pseudo-science, and, instead, teach their children that they were Created--by design, for purpose. That their lives have meaning, and a future. That they are not mere thinking animals, with ancestral descent from the prim eval brute.

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Ian, United Kingdom,"There is little to suggest macro evolution is true in the fossil record. Micro yes. Macro is still very much a theory." How do YOU know what evidence there is? By your own post I can tell that you are ABSOLUTELY clueless about this subject. I have studied and researched in the areas of cellular biology/ biochemistry for 20 years.The numbers of classes I took to get my degrees I couldn't even count. In all that time I have never, even once, seen the terms micro and macro applied to evolution. What is "macro" evolution? Do you think that all of a sudden you wake up one day with opposable thumbs, or an extra kidney? The term is meaningless. If any trait exhibits itself it does so because genes have changed and ALL evolution is micro. It is bizarre to me that people with, clearly, no education on a subject whatsoever, stand up and declare these broad dictates as if they understood the matter through osmosis and people who have made it their lives work must be confused

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