Since the human body contains about a hundred trillion bacteria with their own genetic material, '...from the invisible strands of fungi waiting to sprout between our toes, to the kilogram of bacterial matter in our guts.., we are best viewed, according to the writer of this article '...as walking "superorganisms" highly complex conglomerations of human cells, bacteria, fungi and viruses'. Indeed the human may be considered a human/bacteria hybrid - an opportunistic parasite housing other opportunitistic and often dangerous parasites!
http://www.wired.com/medtech/health/news/2004/10/65252
Bruce Sterling speaks of our concerns about bacteria, in his novel Schismatrix (1985). When Kitsune meets Abelard she realised that, ‘Bacteria still swarmed through his body’ (1985:38) and ‘She never told him about the antibiotic pills and suppositories that she took, or the painful antiseptic showers. She didn’t want him to know he was contaminating her. She wanted everything between them to be clean’ (1985:39). Kitsune was a particular kind of Shaper in this world divided into Shapers & Mechanists. She said:
They took my womb out, and they put in brain tissue. Grafts from the pleasure centre, darling. I’m wired to the ass and the spine and the throat, and it’s better than being God. When I’m hot, I sweat perfume. I’m cleaner than a fresh needle, and nothing leaves my body that you can’t drink like wine or eat like candy (1985:34).
When Nora Mavrides met Abelard she worried that she did not kill him before he got too close, because ‘His skin, his breath, his teeth, even his blood seethed with corruption’ (1985:73). Shapers found bodily fluids obnoxious for they were altered to live without bacteria. Cockroaches played an important part in the ecosystem of the Ren Consensus spacecraft where they lived.
If it weren’t for the roaches, the Ren Consensus would eventually smother in a moldy detritus of cast-off skin and built-up layers of sweated and exhaled effluvia. Lysine, alanine, methionine, carbamino compounds, lactic acid, sex pheromones: a constant stream of organic vapours poured invisibly, day and night, from the human body (1985:55).
Julie Clarke© 2009
http://www.wired.com/medtech/health/news/2004/10/65252
Bruce Sterling speaks of our concerns about bacteria, in his novel Schismatrix (1985). When Kitsune meets Abelard she realised that, ‘Bacteria still swarmed through his body’ (1985:38) and ‘She never told him about the antibiotic pills and suppositories that she took, or the painful antiseptic showers. She didn’t want him to know he was contaminating her. She wanted everything between them to be clean’ (1985:39). Kitsune was a particular kind of Shaper in this world divided into Shapers & Mechanists. She said:
They took my womb out, and they put in brain tissue. Grafts from the pleasure centre, darling. I’m wired to the ass and the spine and the throat, and it’s better than being God. When I’m hot, I sweat perfume. I’m cleaner than a fresh needle, and nothing leaves my body that you can’t drink like wine or eat like candy (1985:34).
When Nora Mavrides met Abelard she worried that she did not kill him before he got too close, because ‘His skin, his breath, his teeth, even his blood seethed with corruption’ (1985:73). Shapers found bodily fluids obnoxious for they were altered to live without bacteria. Cockroaches played an important part in the ecosystem of the Ren Consensus spacecraft where they lived.
If it weren’t for the roaches, the Ren Consensus would eventually smother in a moldy detritus of cast-off skin and built-up layers of sweated and exhaled effluvia. Lysine, alanine, methionine, carbamino compounds, lactic acid, sex pheromones: a constant stream of organic vapours poured invisibly, day and night, from the human body (1985:55).
Julie Clarke© 2009
Add to this the fact that the genetic diversity of our body's bacterial population, in terms of the number of unique genes they possess, is nearly 100-fold greater than the genetic content of our own personal human genomes.
ReplyDeleteAnd also: Blood is our most precious bodily fluid and consequently does not tend to be as carelessly liberated or squandered as other human exudates. This vital fluid contains haemoglobin, an iron rich protein, which transports oxygen around the body. This molecule too has an unexpected bacterial origin that only becomes apparent when its sequences are analysed. Bacteria also contain this molecule, and since they pre-date our arrival on the planet, they must have "discovered" it first. Furthermore, this very personal molecule, which also gives rise to the steely smell of blood, human carnage, or menstruation, did not arrive on the planet ready made to transport oxygen for our convenience as bacteria use this protein for an entirely different purpose. In these single celled organisms, the sole role of haemoglobin is to bind to and detoxify a toxic gas called nitric oxide. At some point in our evolution, therefore, this protein must have evolved and become co-opted to transport oxygen. Nitric oxide is itself a duplicitous molecule with a long held secret. Before 1987, this colourless and odourless gas gained notoriety as a toxic pollutant in car exhaust gases but its long held negative reputation was debunked following 20 years of pioneering work by Robert Furchgott, Louis Ignarro and Ferid Murad. The work of these scientists, which was recognised by the award of a Noble Prize in 1998, contributed to a new understanding of this molecule. Nitric oxide since has gained a new identity, and at low concentrations this molecule acts as a key-signalling molecule in the human body that controls vital functions like blood pressure,healing (and less vitally perhaps penis erectile function) The same gas is generated at higher concentration by cells of the immune system and here it is used to destroy bacterial pathogens. Intriguingly, bacteria use their own haemoglobin to detoxify this nitric oxide and thereby avoid killing by the immune system. Human haemoglobin hasn’t entirely forgotten its distant bacterial origins and in the last few years it has been shown that this protein can, in addition to transporting oxygen, also bind to and carry nitric oxide around the human body.
So, do I understand this correctly, that bacteria are a more complex organism than the human body and are a 'species' that arrived or were formed on the earth prior to the evolution of the human? Have bacteria evolved?
ReplyDeleteSince we have developed a symbiotic relationship with bacteria (& vice versa - is this correct?) is our evolution co-existent?
ReplyDelete