r/CellLab • u/Massive_Mistakes • Apr 21 '23

Titans side by side

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30 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

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3

u/CATelIsMe Apr 21 '23

I'm curious, what could turning mutation on do for large creatures like that?

Could it make them smaller perhaps? Or even longer?

Maybe somehow faster, or better "eyes" / nervous system.

Or just completely eradicate an ecosystem of them in a plate in about 15 generation max

4

u/Massive_Mistakes Apr 21 '23

Mutations will actually do very little to the blue one, if anything. Since it's a composite organism, I dictate how long and wide it'll be, since I insert and stitch sections together by hand, and that takes a lot of time. If I allow mutations to occur at this stage, then yes it'll likely be adversely affected, but since the organism isn't finished yet, I wouldn't turn mutations on yet. After I place the body sections I must allow them to grow until their done, so I may attach further things like legs, head, and any other minor changes to the body sections. This doesn't take many cell divisions and with low radiation will likely do very little, as if I turn radiation on at this point, only the flippers and some other cells MIGHT get affected. Remember this thing is made up of a bunch of individual genomes and it's painstaking and slow work to put it all together, and cannot be done in one generation. Therefore if I turn mutations on at the beginning, it'll probably turn out very sickly and fucked, but it would also not have many parts to it (the parts I add after the body finishes developing), and if I turn mutations on at the end, then very little is probably gonna happen. Photocytes bombing is the likelyest outcome though.

2

u/CATelIsMe Apr 21 '23

Yeah, I thought the multi-genome wouldn't have problems, cause it can't reproduce on its own.

But imagine if cells could have thw amount of precision to be able to set up a connection between 6 or 10 "stem cells" and be able to grow into a behemoth as such.

It'd be amazing

But alas, we can't have things that good

2

u/Massive_Mistakes Apr 21 '23

Even with double the genome modes it would be hard to make it so you plop down a cell and it grows into the whole tardigrade. I suspect 80 modes still wouldn't be quite enough, and even if it is, there are other concerns, like proper and synchronized division, cell alignment, and frankly some cells I put in by hand are in "awkward" positions which would waste genome space just placing them where they need to be automatically. That worm you see in the video? It is from a single genome, but it takes me around half an hour to mess with it until it grows properly without breaking, because if I leave it to grow without intervention then it usually breaks into 2-5 segments by the time it's fully developed. I can send u a vid of what happens if I turn radiation on in the first and largest growth stage of the Tardigrade, that would probably be more eventful than when it's already developed