• Question: Dear all, please do bear with me for a moment, as I will be asking an extremely naive question in the next few seconds. From a genetic or protein point of view, is the mutation (their gifts) in really possible? -Approximately how many mutations should there be in order to create a right- functioning mutant? In other words, was it a gruadual effect or a sudden change? (Because rarely did mutants have mutated parents, which makes me think that it might only requires one fateful mutation to alter a normal human. ) -Were all those skills really possible to be aquired by mutation? (Some of them involved in several physics mechanisms too, which seemed to be beyond what could be done by critters.) -How does Leech's power work? By suppressing the gene? ( The one with whom others' power won't work.)

    Asked by amandazzh to Jo, Loren, Lucy, Sam, Toby on 23 Jun 2014.
    • Photo: Tobias Warnecke

      Tobias Warnecke answered on 23 Jun 2014:


      That’s quite a lot of questions there – let’s see whether we can put them in a logical order:

      1. Approximately how many mutations should there be in order to create a right- functioning mutant? In other words, was it a gruadual effect or a sudden change?

      I guess, it’s useful to realize that most organisms, from bacteria to humans, are pretty well adapted to their environment. That means their genomes are well adapted too, so that most mutations, sometimes the vast majority, will be bad (normally we call these mutations “deleterious”). In this cushy environment, there ARE some mutations that are beneficial, but typically they make small tweaks. So, in this scenario, you’d be mostly dealing with gradual change.

      This change when you pluck the organism out of its favourite environment and throw it into a foreign environment it’s not used to living in. You can do this quite easily with bacteria, for example, by growing them on different foods. Suddenly, the genome isn’t quite so well adapted anymore – it needs to adapt to this new environment and large-effect mutations have a better chance of giving you some benefit.

      If you are in your well-adapted environment, it’s like sitting on a bell curve pretty close to the peak. You might be able to inch a bit closer to the peak through small changes to the left or right, but large changes mean you will end up down one of the slopes, not doing so well. If you start in a bad environment, you start on the slope, and a big change (in the right direction!) might actually help you get to the peak more quickly.

      So, to come back to your original question, both gradual and sudden modes of evolution exist, it depends on the environment how likely it is that the mutations are useful, and a single mutation, in principle, can be beneficial (although typically mutations are deleterious).

      Okay, time for a breezer…

      2. Because rarely did mutants have mutated parents, which makes me think that it might only requires one fateful mutation to alter a normal human.

      You’re right. A single mutation can be enough to disrupt a critical gene and give you a “mutant”. But I think it’s important to highlight that mutations happen all the time, they might just not be obvious by looking at the individual. Every child inherits somewhere around 60 mutations from their parents, but many of them are in regions of the genome where they don’t have an obvious effect on how your body looks or works.

      3. Were all those skills really possible to be aquired by mutation? (Some of them involved in several physics mechanisms too, which seemed to be beyond what could be done by critters.)

      Not sure what you mean by “physics mechanisms”, but I guess the gist of your question is – can mutations really lead to all this complexity we observe today? I think it can! Keep in mind that all this complexity comes from 3 billion years of evolution! In fact, when you do an experiment like the one I mentioned above, putting bacteria into a new environment, you can see it happening over and over again – the bacteria evolve to cope with new challenges, pretty much in front of your eyes, and now we have the tools to find out quite easily which mutations helped them to adapt.

      3. I have no idea what Leech’s power is… :S

      Anyway, if you want to read a good book about these general evolutionary mechanisms, I recommend Richard Dawkins’ “The Blind Watchmaker” – it’s a timeless classic and very well written (and written before the time when he got a bit too obsessed about criticizing religion, so it focuses on the fundamental things)

    • Photo: Jo Nettleship

      Jo Nettleship answered on 23 Jun 2014:


      Hi,
      A question about science-fiction v’s science-fact!
      I find that in science fiction, the writers take a fact and then extend this to come up with their inventions or characters. If you watch some old scifi, you find that some of the “communicators” are very like the smart phones of today!
      For mutations, it can be that the mutated gene is repressed and so although both parents carry the gene, the mutation is not seen. In fact the child has only a 1 in 4 chance of the gene being seen. For example, the blonde gene is repressed. Therefore to have blonde hair, both parents carry the blonde gene, but do not necessarily have blonde hair (my mother had brown hair but carried the gene and my dad had blonde hair and I have blonde hair).
      (dark + dark = dark hair, dark + light = dark, light + dark = dark and light + light = light)
      So, the powers which the X-men have could have arisen because of genes carried down, and mutated, through generations but which were not seen until the two parents carrying the gene came together and the the 1 in 4 chance happened.
      For Leech’s power in particular, this is all science-fiction although you could say that he can make a chemical or protein which is able to be air-borne and which when inhaled, then suppresses the mutant genes in the other X-men.
      Thanks
      Jo

    • Photo: Loren Macdonald

      Loren Macdonald answered on 23 Jun 2014:


      Hello,

      Everyone else have covered bits already, so I’ll just add to this.

      In Science Fiction such as the X men, there’s quite a lot of ‘artistic licencing’ and, realistically, a lot of these ‘mutations’ would not be all that likely to happen in real life. One example that could happen, is with Angel. He developed wings and could fly. Whilst this probably wouldn’t happen that he would just sprout wings, it could be possible for a human to adapt to having wings. Usually it would have to have evolved over time and would replace our arms as wings and arms come from the same evolutionary development. However, in sci-fi, anything’s possible!

      As others have said, the mutations could occur in children whose parents do not have the mutation either due to spontaneous mutation or through recessive genes. However, it doesn’t necessarily apply in this case as it’s fictional- and doesn’t need to follow the usual science rules of inheritance etc.

      I also gave some thought to Leech’s power, and came up with a similar idea to Jo that he might be giving off a chemical or something- that would be the most scientific answer I could think of that could happen. Much like animals give of pheromones as a sort of ‘chemical signal’ to other animals- it could be something similar.

    • Photo: Lucy Remnant

      Lucy Remnant answered on 24 Jun 2014:


      Single point mutations can cause gains of functions of proteins, this is very rare though, more likely you get a loss of the function of a particular protein.

      The Xmen would most likely have had to have lots of mutations to create their new ‘species’ with powers.

      Animals which have changed through evolution, like Red and Grey squirrels have a single native ancestor whose offspring ended up in different environments which they adapted to to survive making them become different species.

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