cells – Harmonia Philosophica

Unhealthy diet. Remembering. Echoes from the past.

Fat cells seem to remember unhealthy diet. A study shows that these cells can be damaged in a short amount of time when they are exposed to the fatty acid palmitate or the hormone TNF-alpha through a fatty diet. Just 24 hours of exposure to those substances is all it takes for a so-called precursor fat cell to have its ‘epigenetic recipe’ on how to correctly develop into a mature fat cell, reprogrammed. (1)

Everything affected by everything. Interactions breeding the future, from the beginning of time. As fat cells, we also remember where we came from. We are also affected by the initial conditions of our existence. And no matter what, we will always remember in our hearts our last moments of non-existence…

Driven away we are. From a truth which we were an integral part of. We have chosen light. Even though we were born out of darkness. In a world full of death and decay, we have chosen life. In a universe full of consciousness, we have chosen inanimate matter.

But our path will be soon again in front of us.

We are still going there.

Even without knowing it.

Lost in the woods.

We follow the Sun.

But it is the moon which draws the Sun out every day.

It is moon which guided us at the beginning.

And it will be the moon which will guide us at the end.

Calling on us… Beyond those trees.

We never wanted to leave in the first place…

In a world full of light, we have chosen darkness. In a cosmos full of life and creation, we have chosen death and destruction. In a universe full of inanimate matter, we will choose consciousness…

DNA. On the edge… Breath in…. Breath out!

For a skin cell to do its job, it must turn on a completely different set of genes than a liver cell — and keep genes it doesn’t need switched off. One way of turning off large groups of genes at once is to send them to “time-out” at the edge of the nucleus, where they are kept quiet. New research from Johns Hopkins sheds light on how DNA gets sent to the nucleus’ far edge, a process critical to controlling genes and determining cell fate.
A report on the work appeared in the Jan. 5 issue of the Journal of Cell Biology.
“We discovered a DNA sequence and a specific set of protein tags that send DNA to the edge of the nucleus, where its genes get turned off,” says Karen Reddy, Ph.D., an assistant professor of biological chemistry at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Picture the nucleus as a round room filled with double strands of DNA hanging in suspension as they are opened, closed, clipped, patched and read by proteins that come and go. At the edge of the nucleus, just inside its flexible walls, the lamina meshwork provides shape and support. But accumulating evidence from the past few years suggests that this meshwork is not just a structure, but is crucial to the cell’s ability to turn large segments of genes off in one fell swoop. It’s as though certain stretches of DNA feel a magnetic pull that keeps them clinging to the lamina in a state of “time-out,” inaccessible to the proteins that could be working on them. (1)

Great! Just great!
A great mechanism.
Doing things in order to achieve things.
Or are the things which that mechanism achieves the things we a posteriory believe it was designed to achieve?

What is a plan?
What is a result?
What is a cause?

We are confused.
We do not have an objective criterion to set the mark.
We do not know what “normal” is.

So let’s accept there is not.
Let’s accept that there is no plan. And that there is.
Let’s accept that these is no cause. And that everything have one.
Let’s accept that there are no results. And that everything is one.
Let’s go craaaaazy ese!
Let’s pound our heads to the wall. (not hard enough, you know)
Let’s just accept there is nothing.
Let’s understand that everything comes from our mind.
Let’s open our selves to the nothingness of the world.

Let’s inhale the cosmos.

One deep breath.
And we will be One…
Inhale…

Communicating… Cells… Humans…

Bioengineers at the University of California, San Diego have discovered that mouse embryos are contemplating their cellular fates in the earliest stages after fertilization when the embryo has only two to four cells, a discovery that could upend the scientific consensus about when embryonic cells begin differentiating into cell types. Their research, which used single-cell RNA sequencing to look at every gene in the mouse genome, was published recently in the journal Genome Research. In addition, this group published a paper on analysis of “time-course”single-cell data which is taken at precise stages of embryonic development in the journal of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“Until recently, we haven’t had the technology to look at cells this closely,” said Sheng Zhong, a bioengineering professor at UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering, who led the research. “Using single-cell RNA-sequencing, we were able to measure every gene in the mouse genome at multiple stages of development to find differences in gene expression at precise stages”.

The findings reveal cellular activity that could provide insight into where normal developmental processes break down, leading to early miscarriages and birth defects.
The researchers discovered that a handful of genes are clearly signaling to each other at the two-cell and four-cell stage, which happens within days after an egg has been fertilized by sperm and before the embryo has implanted into the uterus. Among the identified genes are several genes belonging to the WNT signaling pathway, well-known for their role in cell-cell communications. (1)

Cells speaking to each other.
Molecules speaking to each other.
Particles interracting with each other.

The whole world a giant organism.
A networked place, where everything affects everything.
We all communicate with each other.

It really needs a great amount of egoism and free will in order NOT to…

Cells moving… So what?!?

With a custom-built 3-D printer, scientists have created networks of water droplets bound together with a cell-like lipid layer. Altering the concentration of chemicals in the droplets prompts water to move from the blue to the yellow part of the network, spurring curving. In that way the cells seem to resemble skin cells functions, “mimicking life” according to the article. [1]

But is life only chemistry and movement? Is a moving rock “alive”?

We are lost in our assumptions.

We must forget what “life” is in order to truly understand it…

Learning, DSB, DNA…

Scientists at the Gladstone Institutes have discovered that a certain type of DNA damage long thought to be particularly detrimental to brain cells can actually be part of a regular, non-harmful process. [1]

Scientists have long known that DNA damage occurs in every cell, accumulating as we age. But a particular type of DNA damage, known as a double-strand break, or DSB, has long been considered a major force behind age-related illnesses such as Alzheimer’s. Today, researchers in the laboratory of Gladstone Senior Investigator Lennart Mucke, MD, report in Nature Neuroscience that DSBs in neuronal cells in the brain can also be part of normal brain functions such as learning – as long as the DSBs are tightly controlled and repaired in good time.

Learning entails the notion of destruction. Every time you learn something new, what you knew up to then is destroyed. Literally. And this applies even to learning completely new things: replacing “nothing” with “something” is equally “destructive” as a process. What you once knew, what you once were as a human being, is destroyed to give place to your “new self” – ready and equiped with new knowledge and understanding.

Say goodbye to your old self. Say hello to your new “you”.