|
Main page Science blog My media blog Media page
Sharks Are Our Distant Cousins, DNA Reveals
Its not a single gene, but one shark species sevare found to be nearly identical to those in humans! Amazingly, it was observed that an elephant shark’s genome is much similar to ours to an extent that leads to more in common with it, in comparison to other species — like teleost (bony skeleton) fishes — nearer to us on the evolutionary tree. It was exciting for the researchers to find that sets of genes on chromosomes, along with actual genetic sequences are highly similar in the elephant shark and human genomes! A number of of the genes compared between the elephant sharks and humans are found to be involved in sperm production. Surprisingly, both the species are found to produce sperm that appears to have receptors on the tip, allowing fusion with a female egg. Ah! So, meet your distant cousin, particularly those who kill them to meet their own greedy ends yes, you are killing your own cousin! Hold on for a minute and think about it, before digging that harpoon on their flesh, just to make bleedImage |
|