In article <E95qDo.Dvs at gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca>,
L.A. Moran <lamoran at gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca> wrote:
>I appreciate the point that you are trying to make but perhaps it would be
>best to remember the context. Someone wanted to knw if there were any
>organisms that were more primitive than Drosphila but less primitive than
>C. elegans. Why? Because he was hoping to isolate a C. elegans gene using
>a human probe and was looking for an "intermediate" model organism. Do you
>think that this is a reasonable experiment? Is it consistant with your
>understanding of evolution. (I sure hope not or I have seriously misjudged
>you!) (-:
Don't get me wrong. I understand the nature of phylogenetic
relationships. However, what the researcher was asking for was not
unreasonable. I'm going to trust that the researcher was using the term
"primitive" in a sense that we can understand even if we disagree with
its use here. The researcher was looking for a model organism that
shares a less recent common ancestor with humans than does Drosophila,
yet shares a more recent common ancestor with humans than does C.
elegans. Now, this was not stated explicitly, but I see no reason to
assume that the guy is ignorant with regard to evolution. My suggestion
that he consider a mollusc was made with the assumption that he
understood evolution, but lacked an appreciation for our jargon. I hope
that this exchange will not deter others from asking readers of this
newgroup for future assistance.
And unless there's been a change that I don't know about, it's reasonable
to assume a priori that the Aplysia gene will be more similar to the
human gene than either is to the C. elegans gene. The experimental
approach, at least on the surface, strikes me as rational.
Rich Kliman
Dept. of Biology
Radford University
