Natures wonders: sea anemones heavy metal defenses (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, October 23, 2023, 21:49 (395 days ago) @ David Turell

New discovery:

https://www.vectorsjournal.org/how-sea-anemones-living-on-deep-sea-hydrothermal-vents-a...

"In addition to crushing pressures, total darkness and scorching temperatures, poisonous plumes belch from beneath the Earth’s surface. Exhaust from these underwater chimneys contains particles of heavy metals like iron and manganese, which become toxic at high concentrations. But many animals cozy up next to these vents and form thriving communities, seemingly able to withstand the dangerous metals around them.

"The sea anemone Alvinactis idsseensis has a surprising abundance of genes geared toward producing proteins that move metals into a cellular area where they can’t cause harm, researchers report October 20 in Science Advances.

"Many organisms have a few of these MTP genes for normal metal metabolism. For instance, a related sea anemone that lives in shallow waters has one MTP gene. In comparison, A. idsseensis has 13 MTP genes, marine biologist Haibin Zhang and colleagues found.

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"The proliferation of MTP genes is a metal detoxification strategy also found in plants. The mustard plant Arabidopsis halleri, for example, thrives in soils rich with zinc and has more MTP genes than its relatives, which can’t withstand too much metal.

"Zhang thinks the new finding is evidence of “convergent evolution” between anemones and plants, where similar environmental pressures lead to the development of the same solution in distantly related organisms.

“'I do believe that they actually found a good convergence, or at least a similar strategy to detoxify metals,” says Felipe Klein Ricachenevsky, a plant physiologist at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, Brazil, who was not involved with the study.

"How exactly the anemone MTP genes work to prevent metal poisoning remains to be seen. In plants, MTPs sequester metals into large cellular compartments, or organelles, called vacuoles (SN: 6/4/19). But animal cells don’t have those kinds of vacuoles. “Which organelle is doing that in those animals?” Ricachenevsky asks. “I think that will be very interesting to address in the future.'”

Comment: In nature everything is well-adapted to its individual environment. How that happened is our primary discussion here. Growing elsewhere and gradually approaching the vents as hey adapt in steps is one possibility. The other is direct design.