SUKABUMIUPDATE.com – The research team, with systems biologist Nikolaus Rajewsky of the Max Delbruck Center of Molecular Medicine as lead author, discovered a trait shared by human and octopus brains: a large repertoire of microRNAs in neural tissue.
“That’s what connects us to the octopus,” Rajewsky said.
According to Sputnik news via HiTekno, soft-bodied cephalopods like octopuses (invertebrates) are highly intelligent with highly complex distributed nervous systems and evolved independently of vertebrates.
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Complex nervous systems and intelligence are traits that are relatively common in vertebrates, but rare among invertebrates.
The ability of cephalopods to rapidly change their RNA sequences to match their environment was another surprise, because adaptation usually starts with the DNA, and those changes are passed on to the RNA.
This prompted Rajewsky to wonder what other RNA secrets octopuses might be hiding.
The team sequenced RNA from 18 samples obtained from dead octopuses of different species. This sequencing provides a profile of messenger RNA and the small RNAs within it. The results were surprising: RNA editing occurred in an unexpected area.
The team found 164 microRNA genes clustered into 138 microRNA families in the common octopus.
These numbers are on par with animals such as chickens and frogs (the human genome encodes approximately 2,600 mature microRNAs). 42 of the family are new, mainly in the brain and neural networks.
