<div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">On Fri, Feb 8, 2019 at 12:31 PM Stuart LaForge <<a href="mailto:avant@sollegro.com">avant@sollegro.com</a>> wrote:</span><br></div></div><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"></blockquote><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><i>
<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">> </span>If you look at what percentage of the human genome is conserved across  <br>
different individuals, then it is only 20% of the genome.</i></blockquote><div><br></div><div class="gmail_default"><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"></font><font size="4">I don't know where you got that figure, with the exception of the cheetah there is very little genetic diversity among humans compared with other mammals, "<i>All human beings are 99.9 percent identical in their genetic makeup</i>": </font></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><a href="https://www.genome.gov/19016904/faq-about-genetic-and-genomic-science/">https://www.genome.gov/19016904/faq-about-genetic-and-genomic-science/</a><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style=""><font size="4"><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">And "</font><i>about 60 percent of genes are conserved between fruit flies and humans</i><span style="font-family:Roboto,arial,sans-serif">"</span></font></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:Roboto,arial,sans-serif;font-size:16px"><br></span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:Roboto,arial,sans-serif;font-size:16px"><a href="https://www.genome.gov/11509542/comparative-genomics-fact-sheet/">https://www.genome.gov/11509542/comparative-genomics-fact-sheet/</a><br></span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font size="4">But of course only about 1.5% of our genome encodes for genes, that is to say encodes for proteins. </font></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><a href="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/09/05/encode-the-rough-guide-to-the-human-genome/#.XF3Ey89KjUI">http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/09/05/encode-the-rough-guide-to-the-human-genome/#.XF3Ey89KjUI</a> </div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><i><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">> </span>Some important caveats however to the notion of junk DNA is that redundancy  <br>
and mutation are the engines of evolutionary adaptation. The so called  <br>
junk DNA varies widely between individuals because there is no  <br>
selective pressure to conserve those sequences and so those sequences  <br>
are free to silently mutate.</i></blockquote><div><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font size="4">If there is no <span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">selective pressure then they can't have a function, and if they're full of mutations (and they are) then they would be very poor backups.</span></font></div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"> <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">><i> </i></span><i>I guess I am ok with the term junk DNA as long as one  <br>
distinguishes between junk and trash. Trash is stuff you throw out  <br>
while junk is stuff you keep because you hope to find a use for it  <br>
someday.<br></i></blockquote><div><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style=""><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"></font><font size="4">If can think of any experimental evidence or theoretical consideration that would lead me to conclude that very large parts of out genome is utterly worthless pure trash or even in some circumstances detrimental. Doctors want to transplant pig organs into humans but there is a problem, in 25 different places in a pig's genome there are places where retroviruses have inserted their genome into the pigs genome, and that could be dangerous if  a organs like that were inside a human. But about a year ago scientists used CRISPER gene editing to get rid of those viral DNA segments and produced healthy pigs:</font></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/crispr-slices-virus-genes-out-pigs-will-it-make-organ-transplants-humans-safer?r3f_986=https://www.google.com/">https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/crispr-slices-virus-genes-out-pigs-will-it-make-organ-transplants-humans-safer?r3f_986=https://www.google.com/</a>    </div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font size="4">John K Clark</font></div><div><br></div><div> </div></div></div></div>