Human genes sometimes have some magical abilities as long as there are slight mutations. For example, the mutation of the FAM134B gene on chromosome 5 can make people immune to pain and become a superman who is not afraid of pain; mutations of several genes on chromosome 2 may give you a pair of eyes with different colors as if wearing cosmetic contact lenses.
In addition, the blue race resembling an avatar, super eyes that can see 100 million colors, and people crawling on all fours like orangutans are all "gifts" given to humans by genes.
"Avatars" on Earth
In a remote mountainous area in eastern Kentucky, there is a village called Trouble Creek. The people in the village are blue-skinned people. They were isolated from the world for more than 100 years. Until 1960, the troubled Brook villagers, who were plagued by blue skin, finally decided to turn to medicine. They approached the University of Kentucky hematologist Madison Kwain, Kwain and his assistant nurse Ruth. ·Pendergrass uncovered the secret of Trouble Creek's blue race.
It turned out that the villagers suffered from a disease called methemoglobinosis. This disease prevents cells from synthesizing a cytochrome b5 methemoglobin reductase, causing the concentration of methemoglobin in red blood cells to increase by more than 1% compared to other people. We know that hemoglobin plays a role in transporting oxygen in the blood. When oxygen is sufficient, hemoglobin will appear red, so normal human blood is usually red; when oxygen is insufficient, hemoglobin will appear blue-green. In patients with methemoglobinemia, their methemoglobin has lost its ability to transport oxygen and looks blue-green at all times. As a result, Trouble Creek people's original white skin also showed a sickly blue color, and his lips turned purple.
The cause of blue skin may be acquired. For example, American man Paul Karasson, who took colloidal silver solution to treat skin diseases caused his skin to turn blue; exposure to excessive organic substances such as benzocaine and xylene can also cause people The skin turns blue. But the blue skin of Trouble Creek people has been passed down from generation to generation, and their cause is obviously congenital.
Professor Kavin checked the genetic map of Trouble Creek people and finally found the source of the disease. The ancestors of the entire village were a couple named Martin Fugate and Elizabeth Smith. Fugate had already shown symptoms of methemoglobinosis, and Elizabeth was a carrier of the mutation gene of the disease, that is to say, She did not have blue skin symptoms, but the combination of the two of them greatly increased the incidence of methemoglobinemia. Sure enough, the couple had seven children, four of whom had blue skin. Then, the tragedy continued, because Trouble Creek is a small town with inconvenient transportation, which means that people in Trouble Creek are facing the dilemma of inbreeding, so the gene that causes the disease has spread in the village for more than 100 years.
Fortunately, in addition to the inconvenience of blue skin to people, methemoglobin disease does not cause other pain. Most people here can live to 80 or 90 years old. However, Kawan and Ruth let people in the village take methylene blue tablets and avoid inbreeding, helping them to restore their normal skin color. In 1975, after the last "Avatar" of Trouble Creek was born, Benjamin Stacey, the people here finally got rid of the trouble of blue skin.
See women in hundreds of millions of colors
How many colors can a normal person see? Scientists believe that human cone cells have three photosensitive pigments. These three photosensitive pigments can distinguish the shades and superimposed changes of different colors, so we can distinguish 1 million different colors. This is already amazing, after all, none of us can name all the colors. But you know what? There are people in the world who can see 100 million colors, and all colors have rich changes in their eyes!
Consetta Antico, a female oil painting teacher in San Diego, California, is just such a person who can see 100 million colors, and the world in her eyes is more colorful than ordinary people.
For example, the white light emitted by the most common energy-saving lamp in life, as we all know, white is not colorless, but a combination of multiple colors. A normal person can't see what colors the white light is made of, but Consetta can. She can see orange, yellow, pink, and green in a white light, as well as some magenta and blue.
Another example is the color of blood. In the eyes of ordinary people, blood is a variety of shades of red, but Consetta said no. She looked at her blood vessels through her skin, and she could see that her blood was green and purple from different angles. There are many colors of, yellow and red. When the blood dries, it will turn from yellow-orange to blue-purple. The color of blood of different people also has subtle differences.
Consetta is very happy that she has this ability. This extraordinary visual ability can make her paintings more colorful. This is one of the advantages of her winning the American Advanced Art Award.
Consetta's superpower comes from the fact that her cones have four photosensitive pigments, one more than ordinary people. In 1948, the Dutch physiologist Henry Fries, who focused on the study of color blindness, discovered that although the symptoms of male colorblindness and female colorblindness are the same, their photosensitive pigment variations are different. The cone cells of male colorblind have two normal photosensitive pigments and one non-functional mutant pigment, while female colorblind have three normal pigments and one variant pigment. Although a woman still has excellent blindness symptoms because of a variant pigment, if the woman has four normal photosensitive pigments, does it mean that she can see more colors? There are similar examples in the animal kingdom. Both zebra finches and goldfish possess four photosensitive pigments, which can distinguish subtle differences in color.
In 2012, Dr. Jamison from the University of California, Irvine, performed genetic sequencing on Consetta, proving that she is indeed a four-color viewer. The "gift" given by genes will not favor everyone. Consetta's daughter inherited her mutated X chromosome, but eventually became a colorblind patient.
Family crawling on the ground
Normal children usually start to learn to walk when they are 9 to 16 months old and can basically walk independently within a year. However, there are some people who can’t learn to walk upright and can only crawl on the ground. That is Unatan’s syndrome. patient.
In 2005, Una Tann, a professor of psychology at Kukurova University in Turkey, discovered the disease for the first time in a small village called Ulas in southern Turkey. In the village, he found a total of 4 families with children showing symptoms of walking on four legs. In the most serious one, 5 of the 17 children had Unatarn syndrome.
Children crawling on the ground are similar to chimpanzees. They support the ground with their palms. When walking, the palms and soles of the feet are equally stressed, so the palms also have thick calluses. In addition to crawling on four legs, people with Unatarn syndrome also have a low level of intelligence. The five siblings cannot speak a complete sentence, or even count from one to ten.
Why do people in Ulas suffer from such diseases? It turned out to be the fault of inbreeding. Una discovered that the couples in the village are usually cousins. Due to inbreeding, several genes on the patient's chromosome 17 have mutations. This mutation affects the development of the brain and cerebellum at the same time, so the patient's intelligence, language ability, and cerebellar balance ability are all affected.
Now, scientists have not found a cure for Unatayn syndrome. They can only help the children of Ulas learn to walk upright first. The doctor provided children with walkers for toddlers to help them maintain their balance, and built railings inside and outside their homes so that they could practice standing and walking at any time. Through this treatment, the doctor is pleased to find that the children can already walk a short distance on their legs.
