Scientists Finally Finished Mapping the Human Genome
Scientists announce they have finally completed the map of the entire human genome. Will the information contained within unlock our true potential for health and wellbeing, or is there another more expansive perspective on the role genes play in our lives?
After decades of research, scientists have recently announced the completion of the human genome, what some call “the genetic instruction book.” Widely used for guiding biomedical research, many experts herald this as a crowning achievement in the field.
Dr. Bruce Lipton is a cellular biologist and a pioneer in the field of epigenetics, which takes a comprehensive, cutting-edge approach to the understanding of our relationship to our genes.
“Most people are really excited about the fact that the human genome has been deciphered; they’ve identified how many genes are in the human genome,” Lipton said. “The original reason for the human genome was, it was thought the genes control all the characteristics of our life and therefore if I had a compendium of all the genes I could fix anybody who has a characteristic they want to change. Francis Crick, one of the cofounders of the story, came up with something called “the central dogma,” the belief that genes are the source of biological information.
“They’re translated into another form of nucleic acid called RNA. So, DNA goes into RNA which is like a xeroxed copy of the DNA, and then the RNA is used as a template to make the proteins of the body,” he said. “According to the central dogma, information only flows in one way — it flows from the DNA to the RNA to the protein. This led to an understanding called ‘genetic determinism.’ Genetic determinism is the belief that the genetic blueprint of your life is carried by the DNA that you inherited at the moment of conception.”
This “genetic determinism” was the prevailing theory of genetics for many decades. Lipton was one of the first to challenge it, beginning some 40 years ago.
“The central dogma was never proven scientifically. The central dogma was a suggestion and a hypothesis,” Lipton said. “Now, there’s a new science that really undermines that whole story of the central dogma, and the story is called ‘epigenetics.’ Cancer is under genetic control, so genes control cancer. The new science is that cancer is under epigenetic control. Well, ‘epi’ means above, and I say, epigenetic means above the gene control. Genes do not turn on and off; genes are blueprints. Genes can be read or not read, but the genes don’t determine which one is going to happen.”
According to epigenetics, what does determine what will happen?
“The environment, and more importantly, this is important, our perception of the environment — it’s the information that controls our genes. Change your environment and you change your genetic activity. Change your belief about life and you can change your genetic activity. Now, there’s something even more important and that is this: the old story is that a gene is a blueprint that makes a protein, fact. The human genome project has been whittled down to that humans have about 20,000 genes; there are over 100,000 different proteins and only 20,000 genes! Where’d all the other proteins come from?” Lipton asked.
“It turns out, how we respond to the environment —our perceptions of the world — can alter our genetic blueprint, so that a single gene blueprint can be used to create over 3,000 different proteins from the same blueprint.”
For Lipton the implications of this understanding are profound.
“Under genetic determinism, we are the victim, the gene creates your life. Then all of a sudden we go from victim to mastery, but you have to do it with knowledge. If you have no knowledge of epigenetics but are programmed with the belief that you are a victim of your heredity, then your belief about your family’s heredity becomes your life. Because if you understand you are the creator, then guess what? For the first time, if you understand the nature within, you have the power to change the creation.”
So how do we go about getting beyond programmed thinking and become masters of our genes?
To find out be sure to watch Part 2 of this Gaia News special investigation.
Why Do We Sleep? For More Reasons Than You May Think
Most of us spend about a third of our lives asleep, despite not really having an answer to the question, ‘why do we sleep?’ Now neuroscientists are realizing that sleep is more important than previously thought. They’re also realizing that the worn-out platitude, “you can sleep when you die,” is terrible advice, as that day will undoubtedly come sooner if you short yourself on a good night’s sleep.
According to most contemporary research, you should be getting around seven to eight hours of sleep every night, and if you think you can get by on fewer than that, there’s a really good chance you’re fooling yourself.
Why is Sleep Important?
While the exact mechanisms of sleep are still being studied, neuroscientists including Matthew Walker have made interesting learnings about what happens when we deprive ourselves of sleep and the impacts sleep (or lack thereof) has on society as a whole.
When we’re awake, Walker says that essentially, we’re causing low-level brain damage. By this, he is referring to the build-up of the sticky, toxic junk in our brain known as beta-amyloid. This accumulation of beta-amyloid has been found to correspond with the onset of Alzheimer’s, among many other adverse health effects correlated with a lack of sleep.
Sleep is beneficial as more than just a healing function; it also replenishes spent resources and regulates hormone levels that dictate our appetite, cognitive function, and motor skills. The two hormones that dictate whether we are hungry or full, ghrelin and leptin, have been observed to flare up and down, respectively, when we’re sleep deprived. This inevitably leads to an increase in hunger, but even worse, it leads our bodies to crave unhealthy and fattening foods — those heavy on carbs and light on greens. In fact, people who run on four to five hours of sleep per night tend to eat 200-300 more calories per day.
For men, sleep is an important regulator of hormones, most notably testosterone. Sleep-deprived males can have the same virility and strength as a man 10 years their senior. For women, a lack of sleep can lead to a significantly increased risk of breast cancer and drops in immune hormones.
According to Walker, just introducing a single night of just four hours of sleep among a normal eight-hour sleep schedule, can bring about a 70 percent drop in natural cancer-killing cells, the immune assassins that target malignant carcinogens. Every day our bodies produce these cells and others to fend off disease and maintain our health, and while a cat nap might make you feel refreshed, it won’t make up for the loss of these cells.
