The Anglerfish Deleted Its Immune System To Fuse With Its Mate (wired.com) 53
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: There are few animals more bizarre than the anglerfish, a species that has so much trouble finding a mate that when the male and female do connect underwater, males actually fuse their tissue with the females for life. After the merger, the two share a single respiratory and digestive system. Now scientists have discovered that the anglerfish accomplishes this sexual parasitism because it has lost a key part of its immune system, which then allows two bodies to become one without tissue rejection.
All vertebrates, including humans, have two kinds of immune systems. The first is the innate system, which responds quickly to attacks by microscopic invaders with a variety of chemicals like mucous physical barriers like hair and skin, and disease-munching cells called macrophages. The second line of defense is an adaptive system that produces both "killer" T cells to attack the pathogen and antibodies custom-made to fight specific bacteria or viruses. The two systems work together to fight infections and prevent disease. But in a study published Thursday in the journal Science, researchers from Germany's Max Planck Institute and the University of Washington found that many anglerfish species (there are more than 300) have evolved over time to lose the genes that control their adaptive immune systems, meaning that they can't create antibodies and lack those T cells.
All vertebrates, including humans, have two kinds of immune systems. The first is the innate system, which responds quickly to attacks by microscopic invaders with a variety of chemicals like mucous physical barriers like hair and skin, and disease-munching cells called macrophages. The second line of defense is an adaptive system that produces both "killer" T cells to attack the pathogen and antibodies custom-made to fight specific bacteria or viruses. The two systems work together to fight infections and prevent disease. But in a study published Thursday in the journal Science, researchers from Germany's Max Planck Institute and the University of Washington found that many anglerfish species (there are more than 300) have evolved over time to lose the genes that control their adaptive immune systems, meaning that they can't create antibodies and lack those T cells.
Oops (Score:2)
I accidentally my immune system.
Crikey (Score:2)
This will give me nightmares.
Re: (Score:2)
males actually fuse their tissue with the females for life. After the merger, the two share a single respiratory and digestive system.
Sounds like several marriages I know of. Actually it's mostly the bank accounts and brains that get fused, but close enough.
Star Trek: The Motion Picture scene? (Score:2)
Only works for Anglerfish not nerds (Score:3)
PSA: To the nerds in basements everywhere - deleting your immune system will not get you a mate. Do not go out and try to get HIV as a shortcut to finding mates.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm sure it still exists somewhere on the fringe. But bug chasing here (At least in The City itself. I can't speak to the gay scenes in the rest of the Bay.) has mostly evaporated in the years since Truvada became available. Except for a very small few; it was not so much about catching HIV in the first place; as it was about barebacking. Some gay dudes just really, Really, REALLY don't like condoms; and either they just didn't care if they became positive, or they felt it was inevitable so they may as
Re: Only works for Anglerfish not nerds (Score:2)
Accepting HIV as a consequence increase the odds of finding a mate (up until then.)
Re: (Score:2)
Do we have any Anglerfishes in here? https://slashdot.org/~Anglerfi... [slashdot.org] doesn't exist. Also, I'm an ant! :P
ummm.... (Score:1)
"when the male and female do connect underwater, males actually fuse their tissue with the females for life"
Why portray it as the male fusing instead of both fusing together? The gendrist attitudes of the day are leaking through complete with a portrayal that this poor male fish is somehow trying to own her body.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: ummm.... (Score:3)
Only up to 3, then she is air tight
Re: (Score:2)
Re: ummm.... (Score:2)
Its a joke. Give it a second to sink in. Whats left after triple penetration? Shes out of holes.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: ummm.... (Score:2)
Mein Deutsch ist nicht so gut... and translations are an injustice. I tried a translation of crime and punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky, but I am fairly sure the writing style got butchered. It was not a captivating read.
I did watch the film though.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: ummm.... (Score:2)
So just as with humans.
Re: (Score:2)
After they join they are one fish.
Re:ummm.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Have my own theory on the development of sex I came up with in the early 90's -- not sure if it's an accepted theory or not because I haven't looked.
Anyway, my theory is that when single celled organisms first developed -- there was soon parasitism, as it's an even better strategy than consuming an organism for one quick meal. Parasitism was so common that some cells developed "genetic riders" to add their genes to that of the invading cell -- to ensure their genes were preserved. Thus, sex was born. Later
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting speculation, but I think it falls down at several points because the actual complexity of the biology of existing organisms indicates that other things happened too. and I know I'm not a biologist or biochemists, just a rock-botherer with a thang for Origin(s) Of Life research. for example, you use the terms "sperm" and "egg", wit
Re: ummm.... (Score:1)
Well, otherwise describing the abuse of her partner as a merr sperm organ as "parasitic" (by thr male) would not work, and we could not virtue signal and spew sexist hate at the same time! Duh. :P
Re:ummm.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Why portray it as the male fusing instead of both fusing together?
Because that's how it works. Male finds female. Male bites female and starts secreting enzymes and hormones to induce fusion. The tiny male thereby fuses itself to the large female fish. The male's organs and brain is then absorbed leaving only a pair of testicles.
End result, the animal with the most balls is a female angler fish. It's not unusual for one of those fish to be rocking 8 pairs of nuts.
In some species, the males don't even have fully developed digestive systems. They can't even eat, they fuse to a female or starve. It is very one sided.
Re: (Score:2)
The problem here isn't that this fusion isn't characterized as an equal fusion between male and female. As you point out, it's clearly unequal.
The problem is that even when a fusion (marriage) between male and female human is clearly unequal, we still insist that it be called equal. Everyone is too scared to point out the truth - that it was unequal.
Re: (Score:2)
The problem is that even when a fusion (marriage) between male and female human is clearly unequal, we still insist that it be called equal. Everyone is too scared to point out the truth - that it was unequal.
Eh?
Re: ummm.... (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Brah. I think you're doing it wrong.
Re: ummm.... (Score:1)
It may be the alcohol... (Score:3)
...but this is really cool!!
Always interesting to see how we adapt to our environment...
Until death do us part (Score:1)
Re: Until death do us part (Score:2)
The angler fish just wants his rib back
Re: (Score:1)
What about fishers of men?
Re: Until death do us part (Score:1)
In nature, humans stay together for 2, 5, sometimes 10, but only very rarely more years.
Because they are a village, and care for all of their kids as a community. (What we have day care and school for, but in a healthier, less distanced way.)
Can we go back to this more modern and natural state, instead of thie perverse degeneration we got nowadays, with Abrahamic religion and industrialization?
Re: (Score:1)
"with Abrahamic religion and industrialization?"
You seem to be comparing apples to bananas.
Well thats one way (Score:2)
Thats one way To avoid infidelity. Takes that whole, till death do us part bit to an entirely new level.
Re: (Score:1)
Well, I'll keep them while you wander away to nowhere, sure.
Deal.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
We get an interesting, nerdy article on biology and some fuckwit has to drag politics into it.
argh, that's not the way evolution works (Score:2)
True Facts (Score:3)
Organ transplants (Score:2)
If we can suppress a body's natural tendency to reject tissue which isn't its own, this opens the transplant field. No longer would we have to worry about an organ being rejected because it wasn't a close match. Fingers, hands, arms, legs, entire eyes, pretty much every part of the body could be transplanted/transferred from one body to another without issues.
This might have made things slightly easier for Bonnie Culp [sfgate.com].
Re: (Score:2)
The immune system(s) is(are) an interplay between cancer suppression and having sex cells with a different genetic make up to the parent cells. That's also one of the reasons that when women get pregnant, a common side effect is to alter the expression of both benign cancers and autoimmune diseases (rosacea, psoriosis, etc.) It's not universal, but it is common. See also graft-vs-host and h