Chapter 25: The Secret of Genetic Mutation
When most of the students in the first phase walked out of the classroom, leaving only a few people to stay and continue to listen to the class, Li Xiaohong began the formal course.
She said: "Students, you may know that there are changes in you, but you don't know what these changes come from and what they mean, and from today you will slowly know everything you should know. ”
"Three years ago, when I was not awake, I was still a graduate student about to graduate, my major was biological virus genomics, until now I am still engaged in my previous professional research in addition to my membership of the Blue Dragon Club and the identity of a teacher in the super school, the difference is that I have already graduated from graduate school now, I am a doctor, people in the academic community call me Dr. Li, and I have published my own research results in professional magazines and journals."
"In order to facilitate your understanding, I will combine my own professional and research results today, and I will tell you about the evolution of life and genetic mutations."
Speaking of which, Li Xiaohong pressed the remote control button in his hand, and a huge white curtain above the blackboard on the podium slowly fell, Li Xiaohong continued to press the button, and the projector began to work, and a huge photo began to appear on the screen, showing different kinds of cockroaches.
Li Xiaohong asked, "Can anyone tell me what the creatures in these photos are?" ”
The students in the audience replied, "Cockroaches! ”
Li Xiaohong smiled and nodded, and said: "To be exact, there are different kinds of cockroaches, including ancient cockroaches, modern cockroaches, African cockroaches, Asian cockroaches, temperate cockroaches and tropical cockroaches, different species, individual sizes are different. ”
Then she said: "Cockroaches are one of the oldest insects this week, they lived in the same era as the dinosaurs, through the fossils found so far, the earliest cockroaches appeared 400 million years ago, you know, the dinosaurs became extinct tens of millions of years ago, probably caused by a huge meteorite hitting the earth, but the cockroaches survived, they basically did not change for hundreds of millions of years, but the ability to adapt is getting stronger and stronger, and they are breeding in almost every corner of the world you can imagine." ”
"If you cut off the heads of cockroaches, they will survive for 9 days, and then they will die, and the cause of death is excessive starvation, and I can tell you that if there is a nuclear war in this world, the only creatures that can survive will be cockroaches. The limit of radiation exposure to a normal human body is 800
EMS, 100 percent dead, while the limit of radiation for cockroaches is 967,500
ems! It's a gap you can't imagine. ”
The students were shocked by this data, they never thought that Xiaoqiang as the saying goes, it turned out to be really so strong, such a comparison, it is unimaginably strong.
Li Xiaohong looked at everyone's surprised expressions, smiled and continued: "Let's take a look at another creature. ”
After speaking, as she clicked the button in her hand, the picture on the big screen quickly switched, and it was a variety of different types of mice.
Li Xiaohong pointed to these rats and introduced: "I know that you hate rats, and even fear these small creatures, in fact, the vast majority of people will not like this kind of creatures, because they are dirty and spread viruses and bacteria everywhere, but I can tell you something that shocks you." ”
"Rats have the same bone structure as 99 percent of humans, and if you enlarge and stretch out the whole mouse according to the scale, except for the face, feet and tail, it is almost exactly the same as that of humans, and the length of the genetic code chain of mice is almost the same as that of humans, 2.9 billion pairs of nucleotides for humans, 2.5 billion pairs for all the time, 80 percent of human genes are exactly the same as mice, and 99 percent of human genes are very similar to mice. More than monkeys and gorillas, which are close to humans, and most importantly--- rats are also mammals! ”
Li Xiaohong's words simply subverted the worldview of all the students present, humans and rats, two completely different creatures, are so similar.
Li Xiaohong looked at everyone's stunned expressions, and said with a sigh: "Cockroaches and rats are living fossils, they are the masters of this world, human beings are not, they have appeared for tens of millions or even billions of years before the appearance of human beings, it is certain that if one day human beings become extinct, cockroaches and rats will still exist in this world." ”
"Speaking of which, compared to the vast majority of species on the earth, human beings are the least like earth creatures, a little cold or hot, will lead to the death of human beings, even if they drink unclean water and mistakes, it will also lead to death, human beings are too delicate, not like the indigenous creatures of the earth."
Everyone was blown away by this knowledge and theory.
Li Xiaohong picked up the remote control in her hand and pressed it, the screen switched again, she pointed to the display screen and said: "This is a superbug, also called multi-drug resistant bacteria, a variant of multidrug-resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae - MDRSP3, there is currently no antibiotic effective against it, and there is no combination that can kill it, it is almost invincible, once infected with it, it faces death!" ”
Li Xiaohong continued: "There are many similar superbugs, and there will be more and more, and the speed of human research and development of antibiotics is far from keeping up with the speed of their mutation, and the situation of human beings is not as safe as we imagined." ”
After speaking, Li Xiaohong pressed the button again, pointed to the newly emerged picture and said: "This is the human immunodeficiency virus - Huma."
Immu
odeficie
cy Vi
us; abb
HIV, also known as HIV, works on the principle that the human immune system is deficient until it completely collapses, leading to death. There are four strains of HIV, namely M, N, O, and P, each of which has a different origin, with the most widespread M and N already confirmed to be from chimpanzees, but the rarer O and P were only later confirmed to be gorillas from southwestern Cameroon. There are so many viruses that we can't get rid of, and they're evolving very fast, and you know that bacteria and viruses are cultured in 20-minute increments, and they're mutating almost all the time, which is why we're studying them. ”
What followed was a series of medical photos of deaths caused by HIV and Ebola, and the tragic situation made everyone feel sick, dizzy, and almost nauseous.
Waiting for everyone to get used to it a little bit, and gradually quieted down,
Li Xiaohong continued: "The purpose of this knowledge with you is to let you understand that there are countless types of life in this world, and we have always felt that human beings are the real masters of this world, but I don't think so, maybe temporarily, we humans are in the lead, but it is only temporary, and our human beings are in this time compared with many ancient species, it is simply short." ”
"And our human adaptability is pitifully weak compared to cockroaches, rats, viruses, and bacteria, they are the real superpowers, and if we humans can't evolve, then sooner or later they will be eliminated, this is the law of nature, natural selection!"
"The future of mankind lies in evolution, the source of evolution lies in genetic mutations, genetic mutations bring new abilities to human beings, but I don't know why, in the history we know, almost most of the genetic mutations are side effects, only cause deformities and death, and there are very few mutations that really bring revolutionary positive effects, many legendary characters in history, those legendary characters who have all kinds of incredible abilities, I don't think they are fictional, It's just that a very small number of mutants are aliens to normal human beings, not tolerated by human society, and in order to protect themselves, they hide themselves. ”
"Three years ago, our human beings began large-scale genetic mutations, of course, I am talking about large-scale compared to the development of human civilization for thousands of years, in fact, the proportion of genetic mutations is only one in 100,000, but now this proportion continues to rise, it is likely to reach one in 10,000, superpowers began to appear all over the world, but soon by governments and many hidden folk mysterious organizations gathered and strictly controlled, this control is temporary, and soon human beings will usher in large-scale mutationsAt that time, humanity will enter a new era, and this time node will be very fast, maybe two years, maybe three or five years, maybe even a few months. ”
"The cause of genetic mutations is not very clear, but one thing I can be sure of is that the genes of these mutations are not mutations in the real sense, all the genetic material is on DNA, it is a relatively stable structure, which can be inherited from generation to generation, but there are some recessive genes that are inexplicably hidden in the process of inheritance, and I think this group phenomenon is not naturally formed, but guided by some unknown force."
"And then inexplicably, in the past few years, these hidden genes have begun to show, these genes are not the genes of humans themselves, but from some other unknown species, I said some instead of one, because the source of these genes is more than one species, so the forms and abilities produced after mutation awakening are also diverse."
"Academic issues, I will not discuss and discuss too much with you, all in all, genetic mutation has accompanied the development of human civilization for thousands of years, but it has suddenly begun to appear on a large scale in the past few years, and the consequence of this is ----that two different human groups will be formed within human beings, ordinary humans and mutants, also called superpowers! These two groups are very likely to be opposites, and there will be various factions in the two camps, and what is more deadly is that it is not only humans who have mutated, but also other creatures, animals and plants have begun to show signs of mutation, which means that the future world will be a world of abnormal competition, not only the opposition of the human camp, but also the opposition of other creatures, and the purpose of everything will probably be around the survival and control of the entire earth! ”