The Biological aspect of some science

[NG.1]

Right...

Don't know whether such a thread had seen the light in the past - if so Moderators please ignore - but I would like to discuss some of the biological sciences that had been mentioned in Stargate.

e.g.

Can a speci be de-evolved as with the Wraith in Atlantis? Whether you say yes or no please state your reasons. Also if you say no, is there any other science that can make it possible?

Is gene injections possible as with the Ancient gene story in Atlantis? Whether you say yes or no please state your reasons. Also if you say no, is there any other science that can make it possible?

Right...this is just two examples. If you wish to discuss any other biological aspect of something that had been mentioned in Stargate feel free to do so.

[MarshAngel]

Right...

Can a speci be de-evolved as with the Wraith in Atlantis? Whether you say yes or no please state your reasons. Also if you say no, is there any other science that can make it possible?

I don't think so. Someone with more background can add more science detail but my understanding of the subject is that if the Wraith are to function at all as a living being, their bug DNA is just as valuable as their human parts and are not independent of each other. If it weren't useful, they wouldn't have bug parts at all. If you subtract the wraith parts you don't get a whole human, you get an incomplete human parts leftover. At best they should have been able to make a wraith 'look' mostly human.

Turning Wraith human is akin to trying to turn a human into an ape, by supressing our "human" side. it makes no sense. It seems to assume that you have a two completely different sets of DNA and one can completely function by itself as if you had two beings inside you. Or you can suppress the set of DNA you got from your mother and decide to just run on your Dad's stuff.

Unless they come up with some wacky idea that the wraith are basically like vampires, humans who were bitten by a radioactive bug this will continue to make no sense. It's kind of sad how that would be more believable. Maybe it was the green glowy meteor rocks.

[xfkirsten]

t seems to assume that you have a two completely different sets of DNA and one can completely function by itself as if you had two beings inside you. Or you can suppress the set of DNA you got from your mother and decide to just run on your Dad's stuff.

Yup, I think that's the key statement right there, and a good analogy. You have to stop and think of the other, indirect biological consequences here. What happens if you turn off the "Wraith" DNA parts? What about some of the particular coding in there that might be neccessary just to maintain body systems - hormones, enzymes, and the like? When you turn those off, you're asking at least for major illness, if not death. I'd assume after a few million years that the Wraith/Iratus DNA has become pretty intertwined with the human DNA, to the point where it would be hard, if not impossible, to extract one from the other.

[freyr's mother]

Can a speci be de-evolved as with the Wraith in Atlantis? Whether you say yes or no please state your reasons. Also if you say no, is there any other science that can make it possible?

If one believes in science and evolution (this is in no way intended to to mock religion in any way), then yes, they can "de-evolve". Darwins theory of natural selection says that as cumulative mutations occur in DNA, they may go in favor of, or against the species in question.

Is gene injections possible as with the Ancient gene story in Atlantis? Whether you say yes or no please state your reasons. Also if you say no, is there any other science that can make it possible?

There is an enzyme called RNA Transcriptase. It translates RNA into DNA. Infact, this is why the AIDS retrovirus is so notorious. The enzyme overwrites the cell's DNA leaving the encoding for what proteins it wants the cell to encode. However, in most retrovirus cases, all of the DNA is overwritten leaving only the viral DNA. When someone finds out how to overcome this problem, genetic manipulation of humans would be feasable. I don't know if that has been discovered yet though?

To answer your question, yes it's possible. If they had the RNA encoding of a gene and could mass produce it so it would be delivered to every cell in the body, the RNA Transcriptase would overwrite the DNA of the cell making it produce that gene. How to keep the rest of the DNA intact, I have no idea.

[Jarnin]

If one believes in science and evolution (this is in no way intended to to mock religion in any way), then yes, they can "de-evolve". Darwins theory of natural selection says that as cumulative mutations occur in DNA, they may go in favor of, or against the species in question.

You can't go back to an earlier state, because the building blocks of that state have mutated into a new state.

You might think humans evolving into stupid cavemen might be considered "de-evolving", but it's not. Evolution favors successful reproduction and that's it. If you produce weak offspring, they have a lesser chance of surviving long enough to reproduce, thus cutting them out of the gene pool. Hence, survival of the fittest.

At best, you could consider it a regression, but it's not like you can go back to an earlier version.

[gatelover12]

Turning Wraith human is akin to trying to turn a human into an ape, by supressing our "human" side. it makes no sense. It seems to assume that you have a two completely different sets of DNA and one can completely function by itself as if you had two beings inside you. Or you can suppress the set of DNA you got from your mother and decide to just run on your Dad's stuff.

We know nothing about the wraith's genetic structure, it could have four chromosomes (two Iratis two human) who's genes are expressed depending on the environment. Also, technically you could run on a single x(female)-chromasome if my memory serves.

[xfkirsten]

Also, technically you could run on a single x(female)-chromasome if my memory serves.

Yes, monosomy does happen, but in humans it creates a host of other problems such as Turner's syndrome (Monosomy 23 - having only one x chromosome). There are also species (particularly social insects) that show haplodiploidy, where the males are haploid and the females diploid. That's one thing that I'm curious about in the Wraith's biology. They seem to have a social setup much like social insects, and I'm curious as to whether they're truly eusocial (reproductive division of labor, overlap of generations, sterile castes). If so, eusociality is actually related to haplodiploidy because of the coefficients of relatedness.

[NG.1]

Wow...all the comments mentioned above is interesting and makes sense in their own right.

At the moment I'm leaning more over to de-evolving not being possible, but for those of you that said it is possible...your opinions was definitely interesting and logical.

Now what do you guys think about my other question - about whether gene injections are possible as was the case in Atlantis to make more people able to control the ancient technology?

Also another thought that has come to mind...In SG-1 Jack and Sam had their brains scrambled so many times and new brain pathways etc. etc. was created e.g. Sam in Entity and Jack with that Ancient downloads.

What do you think can/should/would be the consequences of such a thing?

Will it make them smarter? Will it make them dumber? Will they basically have a bit of brain damage now?

After all biology 101 teaches us that brain cells that are dead can't be repaired.

[NG.1]

Yes, monosomy does happen, but in humans it creates a host of other problems such as Turner's syndrome (Monosomy 23 - having only one x chromosome). There are also species (particularly social insects) that show haplodiploidy, where the males are haploid and the females diploid. That's one thing that I'm curious about in the Wraith's biology. They seem to have a social setup much like social insects, and I'm curious as to whether they're truly eusocial (reproductive division of labor, overlap of generations, sterile castes). If so, eusociality is actually related to haplodiploidy because of the coefficients of relatedness.

Oh wow...I don't think I followed a quarter or maybe even a half of that. You don't want to translate it into plain English maybe.

[gatelover12]

Now what do you guys think about my other question - about whether gene injections are possible as was the case in Atlantis to make more people able to control the ancient technology?

Possible? Yes. Reliable? No. Safe? Maybe.

Also another thought that has come to mind...In SG-1 Jack and Sam had their brains scrambled so many times and new brain pathways etc. etc. was created e.g. Sam in Entity and Jack with that Ancient downloads.

What do you think can/should/would be the consequences of such a thing?

Will it make them smarter? Will it make them dumber? Will they basically have a bit of brain damage now?

After all biology 101 teaches us that brain cells that are dead can't be repaired.

I don't think the brain cells would die, but perhaps become overwritten and overused? You must remember just how many braincells are in the human brain, there may be no reason to overwrite anything.

[xfkirsten]

Oh wow...I don't think I followed a quarter or maybe even a half of that. You don't want to translate it into plain English maybe.

Sorry - I'm used to talking to biologists. For the non-biologist people here:
haploid = one set of chromosomes
diploid = two sets of chromosomes
haplodiploid: one gender (usually male) is haploid, the other (usually the females) diploid
monosomy: only one copy of a chromosome

Coefficient of relatedness is a number that tells the proportion of genes shared between two individuals. For instance, offspring have a 0.5 coefficient of relatedness with their parents and with their siblings. However, for reasons too complex for me to attempt to explain here, in haplodiploid species, sisters actually have a coefficient of relatedness of 0.75 with their sisters, but would only be related by 0.5 to their own offspring. Thus, it is of more benefit to them to actually help their sisters raise offspring than to have their own. It's because of situations like that that eusociality (and the highly-structured castes of social insects) arise.

[Steve_the_Wraith]

Disclaimer: I am a fan of Atlantis, and a biochemistry student in university but the retro virus arc irritates me to no end

Short answer the Wraith retrovirus is a complete and utter load of bulls**t

Changing DNA if it were possible on such a large scale - completely suppressing half a creatures DNA is impossible as well as dangerous. For it to work the Wraith would require two completely different sets of DNA which makes no sense.

The main thing that makes it ridiculous though is the mutation wraith undergo after taking the retro-virus which is impossible.
DNA is responsible for creating a creatures structure - its basically a blueprint on how to build the body. However if you change a blueprint after somethings already been built does that magically go back in time and change what the building is - of course not.

If the Wraith had 2 sets of DNA, and if you could suppress one set then all you would achieve is nothing more than preventing the creation of proteins the suppressed set encodes. Doing this would kill the Wraith as it would prevent is non human organs from function and then it would die

[MarshAngel]

I was surprised when they presented this to us after they stated their other bad science premise that the bugs incorporated human DNA rather than vice versa; implying that the Wraith are more bug than human, despite what we can see. At least if they'd gone with the minutely more plausible route of humans adopting Iratus bug features, we could at least pretend that being a wraith is more a virus that alters the human body, one that they managed to cure/suppress. I'm not sure why they didn't go this route. everything - the timeline, the fact that they went unnoticed for so long. - would all make much more sense.

But just to punch more holes into this nonsense. They've contradicted themselves. The bugs incorporated human DNA but now they have enough complete human DNA to be turned completely human? Also, given the fact that they live longer, don't process food, they no doubt have organs we don't and vice versa or at least that function slightly differently. In this transformation process, all these organs were transformed to function in a human way? Michael grew new teeth? His bones reformed? It's magic.

[Syera]

MarshAngel, you took the words right outta my mouth.

Now, I've been figuring that the Wraith have a complete set of human organs, which shut down after they reach adolescence, when (hypothetically), hormones released during that time cause their digestive system to cease functioning in favor of the suckers. On this tack, I think it would be quite plausible to remove the gland that releases this hormone. (It may have to be done before adolescence for best results - think something along the lines of the Castrati.)

A 'fixed' Wraith wouldn't be able to heal quickly and probably wouldn't live nearly as long, but it would no longer be dependant on humans for food, which could be useful. Especially for a slave caste - there'd be more for the 'royals' that way.

[Wraith Scientist]

I've just had a thought. Maybe Wraith are human/Iratus bug chimeras:

Chimera

It would make the retrovirus concept more plausable.

The feeding organs and 'wraithy' characteristics would be purely Wraith cells.