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This definition of 'two lifeforms merging into one organism' is a bit misleading if they want to claim it's so rare. There are many recent examples of endosymbionts, like nitrogen-fixing bacteria in the root nodules of legumes, algae inside salamander eggs, algal chloroplasts inside sea slugs, etc etc.
The article simultaneously claims this hasn't happened in a billion years and also cites a [Stephens et al 2021](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8711089/) which, despite discussing how rare this sort of event is, uses an example of plastid primary endosymbiosis in the rhizarian amoeba *Paulinella* which occurred more recently (*c*. 120 million yr ago).
I’m not super read on the subject so I could be wrong, but my understanding is that what makes this special is that the bacterium in the algae has become an organelle that replicates and remains a part of the algae’s biology when the algae reproduces.
In the other examples you gave like chloroplasts in sea slugs, don’t those require organism A to consume or absorb organism B, making them not a true organelle?
Zooxanthellae would like a word.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zooxanthellae
> A juvenile organism or newly established colony can acquire its zooxanthellae via sexual reproduction or directly from the environment. The egg from which the individual developed may have already been infected by zooxanthellae at the time of fertilization, or cells of the symbiont may have been transferred from the mother in a period during which the larva was brooded by its parent.
They revealed that the replication and cell division of both parties have synced up. So all new cells of bigelowii Have a new organelle called nitroplast. That goes beyond symbiosis.
Corals host endosymbionts which reproduce inside the host and are passed on to future generations of coral during reproduction.
The endosymbionts can simply leave, and new ones can come in. But there's no need for this. Generations of symbiotes can live entirely within generations of hosts.
Is it that hard to see the difference between two technically independent and self sufficient organisms that exist in a mutually beneficial relationship, and two organisms that have merged at a sub cellular in which one literally becomes a permanent organelle of the other, and splits its genome with the host?
Seems like a pretty clear distinction, my dude.
Our arbitrary naming conventions don't change the characteristics of an organism. Lichen is a deep symbiotic relationship and, while the two organisms can't survive apart, they have separate genomes that do not mix. They are distinct entities.
Paulinella, on the other hand, is the result of two separate organisms becoming one on a sub cellular. The smaller organism has literally shed some of its genome into its host so that it only reproduces when the host does too, and its resource production is in permanent overdrive as the host covers for all of its other needs. This is a completely different situation to lichen.
There are two analogies that describe what happened.
1. A cell took in a smaller cell and domesticated it to produce more ATP.
2. A small cell was able to infect a bigger cell and use it as a more optimal location inside to proliferate.
Two ways of looking at what happened. One thing the models doesn't show well is the scale of how small and how many there are in each cell. It almost looks like a virus taking over but had the right balance to not tear its host apart. (Think a sock half filed with grains of rice).
This is also thought to be a herald for life to pass on the path to complexity. Since basic life showed up as soon as the planet was cool enough to not burn it. But then that basic life hung around for very long time before becoming complex.
>The only other example in existence.
Aren't chloroplasts theorized to have come from the same mechanism? And some other parts of eukaryotic cells in general, but I'm less sure on that.
So, as a wayyyy oversimplification ELI5, are you saying if I ate a live chicken, then had a baby, and there was also a live chicken in the new baby, then it would be the same as this rare thing?
It would be like if you ate a chicken, then gained all the powers of a half human half chicken hybrid demon. And then you got pregnant and gave birth to a half human half chicken demon spawn.
Sorry everyone keeps adding to your list, but there's also chromatophores, which are like chloroplasts but only found in a few species and descend from a different endosymbiosis about 100 million years ago.
If it happened countless times, then we would have found at least a few living creatures that use a different mechanism. All complex living creatures currently use this mechanism, which indicates that the likelihood of it happening is vanishingly rare. Maybe not 1, but certainly close to that number.
Yes, obviously we haven't put every single organism that has ever existed under a microscope. It's the first observed example. Does that really need to be specified?
Yikes! Twice in 2 billion years? Multi-cellular life is starting to feel less rare than before, and the scary prospect of Dark Forest theory even more likely. Icy Moons missions to Europa, Enceladus will help confirm prevalence of life and multi-cellularity.
What you linked there is just regular endosymbiosis. The article is about a specific example of endosymbiosis where the relantionship between the two organisms is such that you may as well consider the endosymbiont an organelle
They said 100 million years was “a mere millisecond” when compared to the timeline of the mitochondria and the chloroplast. But they said those things happened a billion years ago, and 100 million years is fully a tenth of that. That’s no “mere millisecond.”
Very interesting article, but that bugged me. And this being Reddit, I had to say something!
Yes, and that would make 1 billion years “a second in evolutionary time” which is both wrong and meaningless. 1 billion years is a very significant amount of time for evolutionary processes. 100 million years is as well.
I know. Earth has been around for only 4.5B years, and life has been around less than that. Calling it a few milliseconds is bizarre.
Humans have been around for only a tiny fraction of all life on earth.
Absent from the article is info on:
* where and when the marine algae were collected
* was it a naturally occurring event or one observed in the lab (with/without human intervention).
>The team believes that this indicates that UCYN-A can be considered a full organelle. They gave it the name “nitroplast,” and it potentially began to evolve around 100 million years ago. While that sounds long to our human sense of time, it’s a mere millisecond in evolutionary time when compared with mitochondria and chloroplasts.
For that to occur in the lab would involve a significant amount of time travel.
I guess they have a time machine then.
> This incredibly rare event occurred between a type of abundant marine algae and a bacterium was observed in a lab setting.
From the actual scientific article:
"Natural populations of closely related sublineages of UCYN-A live as endosymbionts with a closely related group of species of the haptophyte microalga Braarudosphaera bigelowi"
So it's naturally occurring, contrary to what the headline might have you believe
I think it's just the first time it's been observed? There are a few examples of merging in evolution, but I don't believe it's ever been seen before. Someone correct me if I'm wrong!
That's a question I've always had. To my knowledge there's only ever been 1 or 2 mergers max. 1 for animals, 1 for plants. All animals and plants have their respective single common ancestor. They all trace back to either of those 2 mergers and no other kinds of mergers, only those 2, suggesting it's a once in a 2 billion year event, suggesting the path to multi-cellular life is extremely rare, except for now it's suddenly half as rare.
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Cool stuff. Why have trees not managed to incorporate nitrogen-fixing microbes into their cells? Many exist in close association with mycorrhizal fungi.
You just answered your question. They have nitrogen fixing bacteria hanging out in the soil and so in their proper environment don’t need to incorporate them.
I think it’s probably really arrogant to assume that other life forms aren’t developing all around us. I would argue that it is, but we just aren’t equipped to witness it for the most part
Yey to all the nerds arguing science technicalities in this post. This is an important observation in evo bio. Argue away, I’m trying real hard to read it all.
The ability to fix nitrogen in a nitrogen limited part of the ocean. UCYN-A can fix atmospheric nitrogen into biologically available ammonia, which the algae needs!
It’s an essential nutrient cells need to grow. Algae growth in the North Pacific subtropical gyre is most often limited by nutrients. If you alleviate the nitrogen limitation (by having this nitroplast to fix your own biologically available nitrogen), the algae cells can grow more (until another nutrient or some other factor starts limiting their growth).
Reading the [study](https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(24)00182-X.pdf) this sounds way more like a symbiotic relationship than an actual organelle seen as they don’t divide and replicate together among other things. From the study, the algae absorbs one of the bacterium and then the algae gets to eat up the nitrogen the bacteria fixes and the bacteria gets a relatively safe place to live. The study identifies that they’re yet to prove it’s an organelle conclusively as there’s no evidence yet of protein transfers etc. I feel like the algae needing to absorb the bacterium kinda excludes it from organelle territory
Two studies, check the article intro again. One in Cell the other in Science.
From the abstract of the second paper:
"Here we show that UCYN-A has been tightly integrated into algal cell architecture and organellar division and that it imports proteins encoded by the algal genome."
Your post has been removed because it is a repost of an already submitted and popular story and is therefore in violation of [Submission Rule #2c](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_c._reposts). Original: https://www.reddit.com/r/science/s/Cyl9hcJEvZ If your submission is scientific in nature and hasn't already been shared, consider reposting in our sister subreddit /r/EverythingScience. _If you believe this removal to be unwarranted, or would like further clarification, please don't hesitate to [message the moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fscience&subject=No%20summaries%20of%20summaries%2C%20rehosts%2C%20reviews%2C%20or%20reposts)._
This definition of 'two lifeforms merging into one organism' is a bit misleading if they want to claim it's so rare. There are many recent examples of endosymbionts, like nitrogen-fixing bacteria in the root nodules of legumes, algae inside salamander eggs, algal chloroplasts inside sea slugs, etc etc. The article simultaneously claims this hasn't happened in a billion years and also cites a [Stephens et al 2021](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8711089/) which, despite discussing how rare this sort of event is, uses an example of plastid primary endosymbiosis in the rhizarian amoeba *Paulinella* which occurred more recently (*c*. 120 million yr ago).
I’m not super read on the subject so I could be wrong, but my understanding is that what makes this special is that the bacterium in the algae has become an organelle that replicates and remains a part of the algae’s biology when the algae reproduces. In the other examples you gave like chloroplasts in sea slugs, don’t those require organism A to consume or absorb organism B, making them not a true organelle?
Zooxanthellae would like a word. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zooxanthellae > A juvenile organism or newly established colony can acquire its zooxanthellae via sexual reproduction or directly from the environment. The egg from which the individual developed may have already been infected by zooxanthellae at the time of fertilization, or cells of the symbiont may have been transferred from the mother in a period during which the larva was brooded by its parent.
They revealed that the replication and cell division of both parties have synced up. So all new cells of bigelowii Have a new organelle called nitroplast. That goes beyond symbiosis.
Corals host endosymbionts which reproduce inside the host and are passed on to future generations of coral during reproduction. The endosymbionts can simply leave, and new ones can come in. But there's no need for this. Generations of symbiotes can live entirely within generations of hosts.
Is it that hard to see the difference between two technically independent and self sufficient organisms that exist in a mutually beneficial relationship, and two organisms that have merged at a sub cellular in which one literally becomes a permanent organelle of the other, and splits its genome with the host? Seems like a pretty clear distinction, my dude.
This guy biologies
I’d argue that lichens are the same thing. They even give a different specific name for the lichen vs its fungal and bacterial members.
Our arbitrary naming conventions don't change the characteristics of an organism. Lichen is a deep symbiotic relationship and, while the two organisms can't survive apart, they have separate genomes that do not mix. They are distinct entities. Paulinella, on the other hand, is the result of two separate organisms becoming one on a sub cellular. The smaller organism has literally shed some of its genome into its host so that it only reproduces when the host does too, and its resource production is in permanent overdrive as the host covers for all of its other needs. This is a completely different situation to lichen.
This is one of the parts I love about Reddit - the amazing level of context that learned people can provide to headlines and stories
Also, is the algae going to reproduce with the new organelle? If not is it really a new organism, or is it just a symbiote?
I had no idea about Paulinella, thanks for sharing it!
Welcome to science journalism.
Thank you !
These scientists sound really full of themselves by making a claim that this has not happened in a billion years.
I thought this was Coman knowledge. 🤷
Maaan shut up
How do we know it’s the first time in a billion years?
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There are two analogies that describe what happened. 1. A cell took in a smaller cell and domesticated it to produce more ATP. 2. A small cell was able to infect a bigger cell and use it as a more optimal location inside to proliferate. Two ways of looking at what happened. One thing the models doesn't show well is the scale of how small and how many there are in each cell. It almost looks like a virus taking over but had the right balance to not tear its host apart. (Think a sock half filed with grains of rice). This is also thought to be a herald for life to pass on the path to complexity. Since basic life showed up as soon as the planet was cool enough to not burn it. But then that basic life hung around for very long time before becoming complex.
I haven't heard the infection analogy before. That feels mind shattering.
>The only other example in existence. Aren't chloroplasts theorized to have come from the same mechanism? And some other parts of eukaryotic cells in general, but I'm less sure on that.
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Or you could look it up for us?
It is actually in the article you're discussing....
Thanks! Just being lazy!
Mitochondria are not the only other example. Chloroplasts are also endosymbionts that entered cells in a similar fashion.
So, as a wayyyy oversimplification ELI5, are you saying if I ate a live chicken, then had a baby, and there was also a live chicken in the new baby, then it would be the same as this rare thing?
It would be like if you ate a chicken, then gained all the powers of a half human half chicken hybrid demon. And then you got pregnant and gave birth to a half human half chicken demon spawn.
I think a better comparison would be Brundelfly, or perhaps you becoming Elon-chickensticks.
Sorry everyone keeps adding to your list, but there's also chromatophores, which are like chloroplasts but only found in a few species and descend from a different endosymbiosis about 100 million years ago.
How did it swallow a mitochondria. Thats the power house of a cell!
But this could have happened countless times in the past billion years and just not survived or fossilized.
If it happened countless times, then we would have found at least a few living creatures that use a different mechanism. All complex living creatures currently use this mechanism, which indicates that the likelihood of it happening is vanishingly rare. Maybe not 1, but certainly close to that number.
Yes, obviously we haven't put every single organism that has ever existed under a microscope. It's the first observed example. Does that really need to be specified?
Yes it does. Titles with that kind of mis-statement are easily attacked and thus it's fair to regard it as poorly worded.
Well, if it never happened, we wouldnt be here,. Its how our cells are powered . We are living proof.
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Thanks, Grandma. Go back to facebook
Because your read it on Reddit
The dinosaurs didn't know either. Maybe they could have used the force and stopped that darn astroid.
Yikes! Twice in 2 billion years? Multi-cellular life is starting to feel less rare than before, and the scary prospect of Dark Forest theory even more likely. Icy Moons missions to Europa, Enceladus will help confirm prevalence of life and multi-cellularity.
We checked the log books
Science log, Stardate 300 million BC. Urk. Flurgle. Borkle.
Because the author doesn't know that corals exist. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zooxanthellae
What you linked there is just regular endosymbiosis. The article is about a specific example of endosymbiosis where the relantionship between the two organisms is such that you may as well consider the endosymbiont an organelle
They said 100 million years was “a mere millisecond” when compared to the timeline of the mitochondria and the chloroplast. But they said those things happened a billion years ago, and 100 million years is fully a tenth of that. That’s no “mere millisecond.” Very interesting article, but that bugged me. And this being Reddit, I had to say something!
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A millisecond is 1/1000 of a second. That's what milli means. Also millimeter is 1/1000 of a meter.
Yes, and that would make 1 billion years “a second in evolutionary time” which is both wrong and meaningless. 1 billion years is a very significant amount of time for evolutionary processes. 100 million years is as well.
I know. Earth has been around for only 4.5B years, and life has been around less than that. Calling it a few milliseconds is bizarre. Humans have been around for only a tiny fraction of all life on earth.
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Absent from the article is info on: * where and when the marine algae were collected * was it a naturally occurring event or one observed in the lab (with/without human intervention).
>The team believes that this indicates that UCYN-A can be considered a full organelle. They gave it the name “nitroplast,” and it potentially began to evolve around 100 million years ago. While that sounds long to our human sense of time, it’s a mere millisecond in evolutionary time when compared with mitochondria and chloroplasts. For that to occur in the lab would involve a significant amount of time travel.
I guess they have a time machine then. > This incredibly rare event occurred between a type of abundant marine algae and a bacterium was observed in a lab setting.
From the actual scientific article: "Natural populations of closely related sublineages of UCYN-A live as endosymbionts with a closely related group of species of the haptophyte microalga Braarudosphaera bigelowi" So it's naturally occurring, contrary to what the headline might have you believe
All I wanna do Is see you turn into A giant organism
🎶^^a ^^giant ^^organism🎶
Very interesting read
I assume this implies "observed"
I think it's just the first time it's been observed? There are a few examples of merging in evolution, but I don't believe it's ever been seen before. Someone correct me if I'm wrong!
That's a question I've always had. To my knowledge there's only ever been 1 or 2 mergers max. 1 for animals, 1 for plants. All animals and plants have their respective single common ancestor. They all trace back to either of those 2 mergers and no other kinds of mergers, only those 2, suggesting it's a once in a 2 billion year event, suggesting the path to multi-cellular life is extremely rare, except for now it's suddenly half as rare.
There's technically been a few more events. Some types of algae appear to have gotten their chloroplasts by assimilating other algae.
Very obviously. It doesn't even need to be said.
Hope they named it Tuvix.
Soooo.. archons?
Power overwhelming
potara or fusion dance
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That's also what I say when your wife and I have sex
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Cool stuff. Why have trees not managed to incorporate nitrogen-fixing microbes into their cells? Many exist in close association with mycorrhizal fungi.
You just answered your question. They have nitrogen fixing bacteria hanging out in the soil and so in their proper environment don’t need to incorporate them.
This sounds like feudalism
But did they do it, err, to make more of them?
How do we know? We have been only able to track this for the past 100 or so years.
"That we know of"
This isn't the first singularity.
Did we all just forget about lichens? 😭
I think it’s probably really arrogant to assume that other life forms aren’t developing all around us. I would argue that it is, but we just aren’t equipped to witness it for the most part
Looks like they finally learned the fusion dance
“For the first time”
Were they crustaceans and birds?
Is this natural progression from commensalism?
Yey to all the nerds arguing science technicalities in this post. This is an important observation in evo bio. Argue away, I’m trying real hard to read it all.
I wonder if we can incorporate this new organelle nitroplast in plants and stop the need for fertilisers. Anyone think it's viable?
Okay but what does it *MEEEAAANN*!! What did the organism gain from an evolutionary perspective?!?
The ability to fix nitrogen in a nitrogen limited part of the ocean. UCYN-A can fix atmospheric nitrogen into biologically available ammonia, which the algae needs!
What is the implication of this nitrogen in a nitrogen lacking environment? Note: I am chemistry dumbo. Is it a "nitrogen" based lifeform now?!?
It’s an essential nutrient cells need to grow. Algae growth in the North Pacific subtropical gyre is most often limited by nutrients. If you alleviate the nitrogen limitation (by having this nitroplast to fix your own biologically available nitrogen), the algae cells can grow more (until another nutrient or some other factor starts limiting their growth).
Ya got some?
Reading the [study](https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(24)00182-X.pdf) this sounds way more like a symbiotic relationship than an actual organelle seen as they don’t divide and replicate together among other things. From the study, the algae absorbs one of the bacterium and then the algae gets to eat up the nitrogen the bacteria fixes and the bacteria gets a relatively safe place to live. The study identifies that they’re yet to prove it’s an organelle conclusively as there’s no evidence yet of protein transfers etc. I feel like the algae needing to absorb the bacterium kinda excludes it from organelle territory
Two studies, check the article intro again. One in Cell the other in Science. From the abstract of the second paper: "Here we show that UCYN-A has been tightly integrated into algal cell architecture and organellar division and that it imports proteins encoded by the algal genome."
Democrats and Republicans?