![]() It's estimated that today roughly 8 percent of the total human genome was acquired in this way, and it's not all bad news. If the cells it infects are reproductive cells - sperm or eggs - that DNA can be passed down and become a lasting part of the human genome. ![]() Sometimes, a specific class of virus known as a retrovirus, gets novel DNA into our chromosomes during the process of converting its RNA. As a result, you get sick and your body fights to expel the invader, often infecting other people in the process. Most of the time, when a virus shows up, it invades a cell and hijacks its machinery to start making copies of itself. ![]() You may have heard of them they are called viruses. That said, there are organisms that have attacked you or your ancestors and left some of their DNA behind. They do not, unfortunately, transmit any superpowers or modify your DNA in any way.Ī spider encasing prey in its web. At worst, they're likely to cause painful reactions or tissue death around the site of the bite. Most spider venoms aren't very dangerous to humans and even those which are, usually aren't fatal. Other venoms are made of various neurotoxins which kill or immobilize prey, making it easier for a spider to consume them at their leisure. The venom of some spiders still consists mostly of digestive enzymes intended to liquify a meal before a spider slurps it up like the world's most disgusting smoothie. It's likely that venom in spiders initially evolved purely as a means of external digestion. Those venoms are as varied as the species who use them, but they typically have similar goals. Spiders use their bite to deliver venom from specialized glands. None of those are very good for crime fighting. You can join in the debate live on our forum which is that Naked Scientist stock com slash forum or you can tweet at Naked Scientists.The only superpowers you're likely to get from a spider bite are involuntary scratching and, depending on the species, the incredible ability to shake, vomit, and swell up. You can e-mail Chris at the naked scientist dot com. Hannah - So can fetuses become cancerous? What do think about that one? Let us know by posting on the Naked scientist's Facebook page. In foetuses, the cells multiply really quickly but I've never heard of one having cancer. Now, sticking with the genre of genetics, we glide into this question: Dense humans might be better off taking inspiration from geckos, whose wall-sticking ability is due to millions of microscopic Velcro-like hair pads on their feet. Joseph Katz added via Facebook: "the trait that allows spiders to climb walls has a lot to do with their low mass to surface area ratio. So maybe we could purify this goat's milk to produce a Spiderman Web shooter. Hannah - And researchers have genetically tweaked a goat to produce spider silk protein in its milk. And not only is that illegal but I think that's a bit too much of a challenge for today. We could think about, in the longer term, genetically modifying people so that they could sprint and were very active and very intelligent, but that would require us to make a lot of changes by genetic modification. So maybe Spiderman has just got the elite versions of many of these genes. We have people who are sprinters, or people who are very energetic, but Spider man pulls a lot of these characteristics together and at the moment human geneticists are identifying variations in our genes that lead to these differences. Helen - Spiderman had a lot of characteristics of a superhuman that he was hyperactive and an elite athlete: many characteristics that individuals have some of, but nobody has all these different characteristics. For this scenario, let's ignore the strict regulations in place to ensure these methods are used responsibly, and ask instead could we actually make a real life Spiderman? ![]() Hannah - So it is possible to mix the DNA of humans and spiders. And here we would introduce a gene into a specific tissue, for example muscle, and repair a mutation. This is very new technology and it's only just becoming licensed as a medical treatment. We can introduce genes into specific tissues or organs this is the basis of gene therapy. It would be relatively easy to introduce spider genes into humans by adapting the methods we used to make genetically modified mice, for example, and combining this with the techniques used in in vitro fertilization - IVF - that are used to make test tube babies. Helen - Hello my name is Helen Sang I work at the Roslin Institute which is part of the University of Edinburgh. If so we turn to a genetics professor working where Dolly the sheep was created. Hannah - So can you successfully mix spider and human DNA and what could you create.
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