http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:gCSpYK3nn0QJ:www.popsci.com/science/article/2011-09/we-incorporate-genetic-information-food-we-eat-says-new-study+dna+eat+incorporate&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=au
We Incorporate Genetic Information From the Food We Eat, New Study Finds
By Paul Adams Posted 09.20.2011 at 3:38 pm 23 Comments
Sushi [puamelia]
Research at Nanjing University has found that strands of RNA from vegetables make it into our bloodstream after we eat them, and can regulate the expression of our genes once they're inside us.
MicroRNAs, or miRNAs, are little strands of RNA that selectively bind to matching sequences of messenger RNA, resulting in repression of those genes. Their role has only been understood in the last decade or so, but miRNAs are currently believed to take part in a vast number of processes in both plants and animals.
Chen-Yu Zhang and colleagues found plant miRNA sequences in the tissue of animals that ate those plants. One of them, called MIR168a, is produced by rice and abundantly found in the blood of the Chinese humans studied. In experiments, MIR168a showed the ability to affect gene expression in mouse, inhibiting the liver's ability to filter out LDL, the lipoprotein with the street name of "bad cholesterol."
This finding reveals an entirely new mechanism of physiological interaction, which could have significant medical applications as a therapeutic vector as well as explaining processes that are poorly understood (Zhang's example is Chinese herbal medicine). MicroRNA is also used in the genetic engineering of crops, as a method of RNA interference.
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23 Comments
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Midoman
09/20/11 at 3:45 pm
you are what you eat. I was told time and time again. It was proven right time and time again.
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Shakouhousha
09/20/11 at 4:01 pm
I find this very interesting because I'm sure that everyone is like Midoman in hearing this time and time again, I know I have. I wish there was a link to find out more, does anyone know if the results have been published yet or is Popsci just telling us this has happened/going on?
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JediMindset
09/20/11 at 4:09 pm
i kind of always knew this. seeing how when i eat healthy food i usually feel better. and junk food just makes me sad.
_________________
The people of the world only divide into two kinds, One sort with brains who hold no religion, The other with religion and no brain.
- Abu-al-Ala al-Marri
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boka
09/20/11 at 4:26 pm
I wonder how much of our DNA is destroyed/changed from cooked animal meat. That is why I'm vegan.
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Bomb20
09/20/11 at 4:45 pm
I wonder how much worse plant DNA is for us. Thats why I'm a carnivore.
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readysetboom
09/20/11 at 5:26 pm
I wonder how bad meat and plants are for us? That is why I don't eat.
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dwatts1
09/20/11 at 5:35 pm
I hope we can synthesize food from petroleum soon so we get no DNA in our meals.
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Arta Wing
09/20/11 at 5:37 pm
^ are the machines among us? you better watch out! >:)
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Heavyhand
09/20/11 at 6:35 pm
Hmmm... it would appear the corn I ate last night was not fully incorporated into my RNA.
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Vapur9
09/20/11 at 7:15 pm
Could this explain skin color changes over several generations caused by a certain diet available from the immediate environment? How about facial features, intelligence, obesity, and lifespan?
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Vapur9
09/20/11 at 7:17 pm
Which reminds me ... maybe non-kosher foods are such because they were unfit for our evolution? *cough*
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tcolguin
09/20/11 at 7:30 pm
@boka did you notice that they mentioned that rice has a bad effect on the liver? Last time I checked rice isn't cooked animal meat.
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companyion
09/20/11 at 9:26 pm
I wonder how much of our DNA is destroyed/changed from cooked animal meat. That is why I'm a cannibal.
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Emmahenrygus
09/20/11 at 9:43 pm
I wonder what gm crops actually do to us. I'm sure the truth will come out eventually. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction right? The action being modifying crops for better yield, resistance, etc. What could the opposite of that be?
Blow up a balloon really big and it makes a child happy. But eventually the balloon pops. Inject energy in a seemingly positive way, energy explodes back in your face in a negative way. That's the way things work.
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kamikazesmiley
09/20/11 at 10:50 pm
i eat humans so i stay human. "f***ing smart."
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dquad
09/21/11 at 3:53 am
What is the secret of Soylent Green?
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mp
09/21/11 at 9:59 am
Is it best to eat my own arm? Would this be perpetual existence? I know what my foot taste like. I often put it in my mouth. It doesn’t taste well. I imagine other people feet are bad too.
I am bored each time the word Soylent Green comes around.
I prefer a good old fashion human milk shake, don't you? If you worked for a company that makes human milk shakes, how nervous would you be as you come closer to retirement?
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killerT
09/21/11 at 10:24 am
Bravo! Great thread!
I wonder how much DNA is destroyed/changed by eating meat. That is why no animals like to eat humans.
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Shakouhousha
09/21/11 at 10:40 am
Being that everyone here is basically trolling and trying to start a vegan/not debate, I would like to say one thing to the people out there..
You people who are saying that eating human would be best, actually being that it ends up to cause major changes in your body and eventually kills you, I would think not.. Putting a foreign RNA into you may or may not have effects on you because the body incorporates it, but it couldn't do much with it because of how foreign it is.
Human on the other hand would be very very similar, so in essence you would be mixing your own RNA with someone else's, and because it is so similar the body WILL know what to do with it and will start manufacturing with it, thus causing many mutations that will eventually kill you. Isn't that great? Now if you were to eat yourself I see no problem with this, and if you don't feel like cutting yourself into chunks, I will gladly cut off your limbs and feed them to you.
With love, Shakou~
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mp
09/21/11 at 12:54 pm
I love my veggies, fruits and grains with meat at the bottom. Junk food is evil incarnate, but I like that too on occasion. Yes, I believe in the long run we are affected by what we eat.
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1134
09/21/11 at 2:10 pm
Wonder what GMO pushers Monsanto think of this. Hahaha. Gmos are a bad idea until we have done Many Many more studies, things like this, and its effects on the local ecosystem, really need to be weighted before we jump in head first, then again corporate money motivated businesses don't really care about that.
We do not see things as they are, we see them as we are. ~Anais Nin~
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Arta Wing
09/21/11 at 4:41 pm
@1134 love the thumbnail :D
@ Shakou,
good thinking. i've never thought of it that way before.
I'd say our bodies are designed to incorporate random RNA into our DNA, like a neural network, which is like our brains, right? maybe All carbon based life forms work like that? Neural networks besides brains?
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johnnyphoenix
09/21/11 at 10:02 pm
I really think we should all learn to till the land, compost, and above all, grow our own food from seeds we *know* not to be genetically engineered by the likes of agribusiness.
Be careful people - if we don't we lose our connection to the earth that gave us birth. I trust her before I trust any man.
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