Octopuses Rewire Brains

Sounds like a 1950s SF horror movie, doesn't it? Don't worry, they rewire their brains -- not ours -- in response to temperature fluctuations:

Octopuses Redesign Their Own Brains

An octopus has about the same number of neurons as a dog and, unlike mammals, has decentralized brains, distributed among its eight arms as well as its head.

The research described in this SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN article explores how octopuses adjust to cold (and sometimes heat) by "editing" their neurons in reaction to the environment. To adapt to seasonal temperature shifts, they "edit their RNA, which is a genetic molecule that carries DNA’s instructions to produce proteins." In addition to cold and heat, this RNA recoding can also promote adaptation to other environmental changes, such as oxygen level.

Most other cephalopods can also "recode the majority of neural proteins," but no mammals do it to anywhere near the same extent. Octopuses and their relatives may need this ability in order to protect their brains in changing environments because, being ectothermic ("cold-blooded"), they can't regulate their body temperature the way we do.

Wouldn't it be nifty if we could rewire our brains in response to environmental and internal factors such as food intake and energy output, to self-regulate our own weight at will? Some team of mad scientists should look into reprogramming the human genome to create that ability.

Other fascinating facts about octopus brain powers, including tool use and the ability to recognize human individuals:

Octopuses Keep Surprising Us

If not for the sad fact that octopuses not only lead solitary lives but also die soon after breeding -- all their offspring grow up as orphans -- and thus can't pass on learned knowledge and skills to the next generation, they might dominate the sea just as we dominate the land.

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Our Viral Symbiotes

About 8% of our DNA may have come from ancient viruses that infiltrated our cells, where they established permanent residence.

Viral "Fossils" in Our DNA

The human genome includes 100,000 pieces of "ancient viral DNA." Recent studies of what function, if any, this "fossil" DNA might perform in our bodies suggest that it may play a vital role in boosting our immune systems. Amazingly, viruses that invade our cells sometimes not only become part of our chromosomes but become inheritable. The article summarizes the process thusly:

"When a type of virus known as a retrovirus infects a cell, it converts its RNA into DNA, which can then become part of a human chromosome. Once in a while, retroviruses infect sperm and egg cells and become 'endogenous,' meaning they are passed down from generation to generation."

In science-fiction treatments of traditional monsters such as vampires and werewolves, this ability of some retroviruses could be invoked to rationalize how a naturally evolved creature of a different species could convert a human victim—or willing host—into a member of the "monster" species.

When Walt Whitman declared, "I contain multitudes," he wrote truer than he could have suspected. That quote features in the title of a book by Ed Yong, I CONTAIN MULTITUDES: THE MICROBES WITHIN US AND A GRANDER VIEW OF LIFE, about microbiomes inside animals and especially humans, in the context of a vision of our bodies as "living islands" with millions of inhabitants.

On a totally different topic, but harking back to some of my earlier posts, here is a detailed article about the intelligence of octopuses, to which I've alluded more than once in the past. As the article says, they're probably the closest to intelligent aliens of any species we currently know. Cool!

Another Path to Intelligence

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Undersea Aliens

Peter Godfrey-Smith, a professor at the University of Sydney and City University of New York, believes the octopus is the closest thing to an alien living on Earth with us. Octopuses "are the most complex animal with the most distant common ancestor to humans."

Octopus Intelligence

In many ways, octopuses seem as different from us as an advanced creature can be and evolve on the same planet. They have three hearts and blue, copper-based blood. They have the ability to change color, which they use for camouflage. Suppose we encountered an extraterrestrial species of intelligent cephalopods who communicated by waves of colors? We would have to learn a whole new mode of language. Octopuses "developed eyes, limbs, and brains via a completely separate route" from us. With neurons distributed through their bodies instead of solely localized in their heads, we might say they have brains in their arms. They show considerable intelligence, such as in escaping from confinement, and they can tell human individuals apart. Octopuses seem to play, another sign of high intelligence. They also display curiosity, which Godfrey-Smith thinks may be evidence of subjective consciousness. If so, consciousness has appeared separately at least twice on Earth.

It has been suggested that a possible reason why they haven't evolved even higher intelligence springs from their reproductive cycle. Male octopuses typically die soon after mating, and females don't live long past the hatching of their offspring. Therefore, adults don't survive to pass on knowledge and skills to their young. Octopuses can't have much of a culture, if any. Their solitary lifestyle (aside from mating) is probably another factor, since gregarious species tend to be more intelligent than solitary ones; interactions with other members of one's species in a group require mental flexibility.

Godfrey-Smith makes the optimistic assumption that the evolution of consciousness at least twice on Earth implies consciousness isn't a rare fluke, but a potentially common natural development. That assumption, if valid, bodes well for the discovery of sapient beings elsewhere in the universe. If a race of giant octopuses on another planet—perhaps one mainly or entirely covered by water—overcame the disadvantages of their short, solitary lives, maybe by evolving a long-lived, asexual caste responsible for the care and education of the young, they could create something we would recognize as a culture.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt