Tuesday, August 26, 2008

abstract to my seminar ppt...

Darwinian Evolution on a Chip

Brian M. Paegal, Gerald F. Joyce

PLoS Biol 6(4):e85. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0060085-

Abstract

Darwinian evolution in nature has led to development of many sophisticated enzymes. Recapitulation of Darwinian evolution in vitro has emerged as chemical tool for optimizing functional ribozymes in the lab. A ribozyme that catalyzes template-directed ligation of oligonucleotide substrate was made to evolve continuously under the selective pressure of reducing substrate concentration. A micro-chip based automated serial dilution circuit was developed which carried out serial 10-fold dilution after exponential growth phase, this was repeated for 500 log-growth iterations. Evolution of the ribozyme was observed during the 70h evolution process on the chip. The ribozymes adapted and achieved progressively faster growth rates over time. The final evolved ribozyme contained 11 mutations which conferred 90-fold improvement in substrate utilization, coinciding with the applied selective pressure. The constellation of mutations that aroused during this evolution process and the corresponding phenotypic changes that were responsible for the adaptation were analyzed. The system thus, aids in accelerating evolution and also allows the experimenter to observe and manipulate adaptation.

References-

  1. Joyce GF (2004) Directed evolution of nucleic acid enzymes. Ann. Rev. Biochem.73:791-836

  1. Bartel D. P., Szostak J. W. (1993) Isolation of new ribozymes from a large pool of random sequences, Science 261: 1411-1418

  1. Cadwell R. C., Joyce G. F. (1992) Randomization of genes by PCR mutagenesis. PCR Methods Applications 2: 28-33

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

fun filled family...

family meetings are always fun...
the best of those ...was the one when we had gathered for my aunt's 50th b'day n my uncle's 61st...
i guess all my cousins and the family as a whole was together for 3-4 days!!!
this family meet was special coz inspite of a major plan flop show...we had hell lot of fun!!!!
right from playing fire in the mountain to the silliest card game(bhikar-savkar) we played everything...(unfortunately did not know hi-jack then..)...we played cards for the whole night...!!!
even had excellent time on beach...aaahhh i treasure those days!!

family gatherings are always fun...they are just filled with laughter...lots of card games and quality time with everyone in the family...
though plans don't workout often...there's no reason we stop having or have less of fun...!

now eagerly waiting for the ganpati's....its a fun season to experience..right from the preparations...to the chanting of the aarti...and screaming on the top of the voice.."ganpati bappa morya"....completely filled with enthusiasm...its the time you definitely cant afford missing....

with limited family gatherings happening each year... on top of it you tend to miss a few of them... let me tell one thing...learn't it a hard way...it really hurts to miss those...and you really feel.....y? i had to miss it...

its truly khedkar mania that rules!!!

Sunday, August 17, 2008

http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/theory-of-evolution.htm

a good read...(continue for the next pages...)

gaia hypothesis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis

sounds weird....
guess...got the fact-reason relationship all wrong..very difficult to digest!

something on my mind...questions?

questions???
we are so much associated with them...i mean they are the thing in our life!!! though usually when one hears the word...what first comes to the mind....are the questions asked in the exam!!!
but here i m not referring to those...definitely not!

our mind is the place where they arise...some are answered there itself..some take time to be answered...some remain unanswered and some we just ignore...
there are other aspects to questions ... as in what are they referring to a person a phenomenon a behavior or something else...i know there must be many more aspects...but at present i can only think of these...

i intend to use this post as a repository of questions...any question that comes to my mind...or anyone's mind here...and whoever feels to comment on the question or answer it or wishes to post a new question...is free to do so...

so, here i begin-
  • what is intelligence??? how do you define it??
  • how does a pen drive store data...for that matter even a Cd???
  • what is time???( i mean..this question sounds silly...but i really don't know....)

....ohkk.... i mean they are so damn varied n random...anyways i don't care..these were the first few that came on my mind at this point of time!!!

i think...it's just a matter of posting what's on your mind...!

relationships..interactions..generalizations..

quite recently have engaged myself in reading blogs...mostly posted by my friends!!! thought that should give it a try...though not sure will continue...????

i always thought of relationships as something unique..as in any relationship u talk of...the ppl involved, the duo or the trio involved are mutually exclusive... what i mean here is the image of the person u r in relationship with...is an exclusive set of characters that u define for yourself based on the experience and interaction with that person....u also tend to improve upon those characters or add on to the existing ones.... this is a dynamic process!!!

according to me ... or rather i enjoy keeping this interactions (with all those whom i have met till date) exclusive...!but what i observe today and it also does seem to happen is that, things like blog or scrapping on orkut or even if u take testimonials for that matter, make the whole thing quite generalized...

i mean i don't like judging a person or being conclusive enough on certain characters based on someone Else's views or experiences or interactions with that person...and watever u say but once u come across a certain feature abt a person frm someone else...there is bound to be a bias abt it...

...here i m writing this blog...this may seem to b a very complex or rather pretty faltu thought to some... i personally wont like to discuss this with althose whom i know are not intrested in such discussions...but still here i m generalizing !!!
n i hate doing that...