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Is There A Living Thing With NO CELLS?Moderator: BioTeam
34 posts • Page 2 of 3 • 1, 2, 3
@MrMistery thanks for that Mimivirus idea that just might work. I will tell you after I hear his response.
"To become old and wise. You must first be young and stupid."-???me???
well the mimivirus was a fail for a few defects in it ways of life
"To become old and wise. You must first be young and stupid."-???me???
what would be a correct answer to that? Plant cells that die, like those in cork? Botanists still call them cells, but if you ask me, they are simply leftover walls. Or maybe a RBC or a sieve tube element? If you ask me they are still alive... I don't think your question has an answer either
"As a biologist, I firmly believe that when you're dead, you're dead. Except for what you live behind in history. That's the only afterlife" - J. Craig Venter
cause it has metabolism and protein synthesis. Very low ones, but still. And it has an electrically charged membrane. It is alive because it has to be destroyed in 3 months, as it cannot live for long without a nucleus, even at that metabolism.
"As a biologist, I firmly believe that when you're dead, you're dead. Except for what you live behind in history. That's the only afterlife" - J. Craig Venter
I thought genetic material was a prerequisite for life.
Is there RNA floating around in the RBCs or is the low metabolism being carried out using old enzymes which are taking a bit of time(3months) to be used up? When a person dies, the hair and nails continue to grow for some time due to some slow metabolism going on but the body taken as a whole is still considered to be dead is it not?
Genetic material is a prerequisite of life, but a cell can nevertheless be alive without genetic material. Take the case of a sieve tube element if you don't like RBC: the adjacent cell gives it all the proteins needed to survive for a long time and carry out all the functions it needs, although it looses some organelles. If that isn't ultraspecialised life, i don't know what is.
The way I found it in all books is that the RBC does have a low rate of protein synthesis and a low rate of energetic metabolism. Plus, as I said, I regard as indubitable proof of its vitality the fact that its membrane is polarized, something completely absent in dead cells. BTW, is that nail stuff true? I always thought it was some sort of urban mith. "As a biologist, I firmly believe that when you're dead, you're dead. Except for what you live behind in history. That's the only afterlife" - J. Craig Venter
After so many years of believing in rubbish I am pleased to have been corrected on the hair and nail stuff.
On the issue of RBCs, I am still not clear where the RBC gets its enzymes from to carry out metabolism. Your sieve tube element (I will have to look this one up) sounds like a person being kept alive on a ventilator and being fed artificially. Turn the ventilator off and you see that they were dead all the time. Can that really be called life?
about the nails, i think we came to a similar conclusion a while back.
About the RBC and sieve tube element, I guess I said all I have to say. If you don't consider them alive, then we'll agree to disagree. BTW, could platelets do as a dead functioning cell? Cause they are not cells, but they are dead and functioning.. "As a biologist, I firmly believe that when you're dead, you're dead. Except for what you live behind in history. That's the only afterlife" - J. Craig Venter
34 posts • Page 2 of 3 • 1, 2, 3
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