SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
With RNA, Researchers Transfer Memories Between Sea Slugs
In the first chunk of their study, the team, led by David Glanzman, worked with groups of a marine slug called Aplysia. One group of slugs got shocked on the tail once every 20 minutes for a total of five shocks. The next day, they went through the same shock session. The point was to prime them to use what's called a defensive withdraw reflex — basically, the slug version of a flinch.
When Glanzman and his team later physically tapped these slugs on their tails, the creatures contracted for an average of 50 seconds. But when the team tapped another, shock-free group, those slugs only shied away for about one second.
Here's where things get interesting. The researchers then extracted ribonucleic acid (RNA) — the cellular messenger that carries out the genetic instructions of DNA — from the nervous systems of both the shock and non-shock groups. They took this RNA and injected it into a third set of slugs that hadn't had to deal with any shocks or taps. Seven of these slugs got the shock group's RNA, seven got the non-shock-group's RNA.
Next, the team tapped these RNA-injected slugs on their tails. Those that had received the shock group's RNA responded almost exactly like the shock group: They recoiled for about 40 seconds. "It was as though we transferred the memory," Glanzman said in a press release.
Also at Smithsonian Magazine.
RNA from Trained Aplysia Can Induce an Epigenetic Engram for Long-Term Sensitization in Untrained Aplysia (open, DOI: 10.1523/ENEURO.0038-18.2018) (DX)
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Wednesday May 16 2018, @05:29PM
Well, this seems more like what you get with epigenetic modifications than what we usually call memory. Yes, it *is* memory, of a sort, and with a very low bandwidth and poor specificity. There are "memories" like this that can cause people to tend to gain weight more easily, to be more sensitive to allergens, etc. (But notice, I didn't say more sensitive to specific allergens. I don't believe that has been demonstrated. As I said, low bandwidth and poor specificity.)
If that's the same general mechanism, then you can't really say the memory was transferred unless it is retained for a relatively long time. If it evaporates quickly, then what's been transferred is more like a transient sensitivity to a particular stimulus. An interesting question in evaluating "How long is required to say it was a memory transferred?" is "How long does a sea slug live?". Another interesting question would be "How long does the original sea slug 'remember' it's sensitivity?".
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.