Is consciousness to be found in quantum processes in microtubules?

[Write4U]

Continuing exploring the micro world, the earliest forms of evolutionary processes on which all of life and possibly consciousness is founded.

 

[Write4U]

In furtherance of post# 1839

Frustule

Scanning electron micrographs of frustules from some algae species - scale bar = 10 micrometres in a,c and d and 20 micrometres in b

A frustule is the hard and porous cell wall or external layer of diatoms. The frustule is composed almost purely of silica, made from silicic acid, and is coated with a layer of organic substance, which was referred to in the early literature on diatoms as pectin, a fiber most commonly found in cell walls of plants.[1][2] This layer is actually composed of several types of polysaccharides.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frustule

Diatoms Reproduction
Reproduction in diatoms can take place by two different processes, sexual and asexual. The following article will help you to gain information regarding subject of reproduction in these tiny single-celled algal species.

Reproduction in diatoms can take place by two different processes, sexual and asexual. The following article will help you to gain information regarding subject of reproduction in these tiny single-celled algal species.

Diatoms are unicellular organisms, which are covered with a cell wall containing silica, which is called frustule. They belong to the major algal group that consists of many types of phytoplankton. These diatoms can exist in colonies, and form shapes like filaments, zigzag and stellated patterns, and ribbon-shaped colonies.

Diatoms have a nucleus, cytoplasm, vacuoles, and chromatoplasts as cell components. The silicon wall is porous with different designs at various places for passage of gases and nutrients within the cell. These algae are classified into pinnate and centric groups. The ones belonging to the latter group are round in shape, and the former ones are elongated.

The reproduction process can occur by either sexual or asexual reproduction. All diatoms pass through a seed-like or a spore phase called the resting spore.

Asexual Reproduction

This is the primary form of reproduction, and it occurs by binary fission. In this process, the DNA undergoes replication that causes the chromosomes to divide into two identical halves. This leads to the formation of two frustules or theca. Each daughter cell receives one of the parent cell’s frustules, like other organisms that reproduce asexually. This causes the small frustule or hypotheca to form a larger frustule or epitheca. The parent cell grows larger to divide the two daughter cells by pushing out of the valve. Each daughter cell produces a new cell wall, and such units receive one valve each. This type of reproduction causes reduction in size of a daughter cell from the average size. It eventually leads to shrinkage in the size of cells, which are just one-third their maximum size. This ‘shrinking division’ is a unique mode of asexual reproduction in diatoms. The algae also need to restore their original cell size of population, and therefore undergo sexual reproduction.

Sexual Reproduction

Diatoms are non-motile organisms, and therefore the sperms have flagella. The vegetative cells of diatoms are diploid (2n), and hence, they undergo meiosis. The cells produce sexual gametes that fuse to form a zygote. The males produce sperms and females produce eggs. The female cells tend to bend, and create an opening in the cell wall. This helps the sperms to enter the female cell, and fertilize it. The egg gets encased in an envelope-like structure, which produces its own shell and nucleus. Soon, the diatom will grow to its full size. The parent cell and the new diatom form auxospores, and act as if it is in a dormant stage called ‘resting spores’. This helps the cells to survive long periods of time under unfavorable conditions. Once the cells get proper conditions to grow, they continue with their sexual reproduction.

They initially follow the primary modes of reproduction, i.e., asexual reproduction. When the cell size in population decreases considerably, they switch over to sexual reproduction.

https://biologywise.com/diatoms-reproduction#:

 

[James R]

Write4U:

You look like you're blogging.

Is there something you'd like to discuss?

 

[Write4U]

Write4U:
You look like you're blogging.

I'm not sure I know what that means. I am merely posting some recent scientific developments and discoveries on the thread's subject matter.

Is there something you'd like to discuss?

Sure, but no one seems to want to engage on this subject except for some snide remarks about quackery.

 

[James R]

I'm not sure I know what that means.

It means that you're just cut-and-pasting everything that grabs your interest at this instant in time, from elsewhere on the internet.

You apparently want people to just react to long posts of random wikipedia excerpts and the like, on disparate topics. You post a lot of definitions, like you've just discovered them.

It's great you're reading and learning stuff, but this is a discussion forum. If you're only posting to say the equivalent of "here's something I found today that interests me", without having any aim beyond that, it's unlikely to attract much interest from other forum members. More importantly, duplicating random bits of information available elsewhere on the internet just takes up space on our servers, uselessly.

 

[Write4U]

It means that you're just cut-and-pasting everything that grabs your interest at this instant in time, from elsewhere on the internet.

No I don't grab everything. Stop the exaggeration, please.

You apparently want people to just react to long posts of random wikipedia excerpts and the like, on disparate topics.

I only quote what I believe to be of interest to several topics currently under discussion.

You post a lot of definitions, like you've just discovered them.

No, I want to make sure that the definition I am using is properly understood. In the past I have had to waste reams of pages explaining some of the definitions I have used, because they were misinterpreted by people who only had cursory knowledge of some definitions and were not aware of the underlying and sometimes "common denominators" in different definitions.

So I post definitions to clarify precisely what I mean and avoid confusion and possible misinterpretation. It has resulted in minimal discussion on semantics.

As to overloading the servers, I just discovered how that happens. This happens not because of the posts per se, but of the hidden links in some of the quoted materials which refers to a large data base.
I promise to be more careful in quoting links to related materials. The server does warn when a post goes over 1000 words.

And when I quote someone else's verbose post, it also counts toward the total words of my post, so in future I shall be more discreet in quoting a statement I wish to respond to.

 

[Write4U]

Are plants conscious? Seems they are. They are aware of light for one. What causes plants to process the direction from whence the light comes. How does a plant acquire Heliotropic abilities? How about response to chemicals? How about response to sound?

 

[Write4U]

Continued from Chemical Evolution.

While this thread started as reference to the possible role of MT (neural network of the brain) in the emergence of consciousness, the reference library I compiled also addresses the MT role in the cytoskeleton of both Prokaryotic and Eukaryotic organisms and in particular their essential role in mitosis (cell division), as well as the earliest dynamical mechanism for motion. Microtubules must have occurred very early on in the transmutation from pure chemistry to biochemistry and cell division.

Most Prokaryotic and ALL Eukaryotic organisms have a "common denominator" in microtubules. This would suggest the very early self-assembling polymerization of just 2 tubulins into a bipolar coil structure which acts as a variable rheostat for transport of electro-chemical information. MT are the heart of the neural network and is present by the trillions. Each cell may have hundreds of MT . The brain itself has billions of MT, including the formation of pyramidal memory storage blocks.

A simple example:

Image of the mitotic spindle in a human cell showing microtubules in green, (chromosomes (DNA) in blue, and kinetochores in red).

Microtubules control the exact copying of DNA, a remarkable ability akin to true computing.

 

[Write4U]

Cell biology

The first microtubules
Nature volume 480, page416(2011)Cite this article

Bacteria make long protein chains that may be similar to the ancestors of microtubules, structures found in the cells of more complex organisms. Microtubules perform crucial cellular tasks, including pulling chromosomes apart during cell division.

Apparently MT are not instrumental for mitosis in bacteria which have circular DNA and divide by binary fission

Grant Jensen and Martin Pilhofer at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena and their team captured cryo-electron micrographs of several species of Prosthecobacter bacteria, which contain multi-protein chains reminiscent of microtubules. These are forged from repeated spiral arrangements of proteins that are evolutionarily related to those in the microtubules of other organisms.

It is not clear what bacterial microtubules do. The authors suggest that the bacteria that gave rise to other, more complex organisms passed on proteins capable of forming microtubules.
https://www.nature.com/articles/480416d#

 

[Write4U]

Microtubules Nonlinear Models Dynamics Investigations through the exp(−Φ(ξ))-Expansion Method Implementation
by Nur Alam and Fethi Bin Muhammad Belgacem

1 Department of Mathematics, Pabna University of Science & Technology, Pabna 6600, Bangladesh
2 Department of Mathematics, Faculty of Basic Education, PAAET, Al-Ardhiya 92400, Kuwait

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed;
Academic Editor: Reza Abedi
Mathematics 2016, 4(1), 6; https://doi.org/10.3390/math4010006

Abstract

In this research article, we present exact solutions with parameters for two nonlinear model partial differential equations(PDEs) describing microtubules, by implementing the exp(−Φ(ξ))-Expansion Method.

The considered models, describing highly nonlinear dynamics of microtubules, can be reduced to nonlinear ordinary differential equations. While the first PDE describes the longitudinal model of nonlinear dynamics of microtubules, the second one describes the nonlinear model of dynamics of radial dislocations in microtubules.

The acquired solutions are then graphically presented, and their distinct properties are enumerated in respect to the corresponding dynamic behavior of the microtubules they model.

Various patterns, including but not limited to regular, singular kink-like, as well as periodicity exhibiting ones, are detected. Being the method of choice herein, the exp(−Φ(ξ))-Expansion Method not disappointing in the least, is found and declared highly efficient.

https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/4/1/6/htm

 

[Dennis Tate]

Chemical reactions and according to Roger Penrose this phenomenon begins to become expressed even at quantum scale.

As I understand it, a quantum event is a threshold event. A limit has been exceeded and a corrective "action" takes place. While non-sentient particles cannot feel, they do in fact experience a "bing", a threshold event.

An earthquake is experienced by all objects in its range of influence. They just don't know this, except for organic biology. It is what sets organics apart from inorganics, in the world of chemicals.

But quantum is responsible for chemical action and reaction in both in-organic (elemental) chemicals and in organic (living) objects.

IMO, Organic matter has evolved in acquiring a cognitive "sensitivity" to quantum events which translates quantum "bings" into sentient and emotional chemical reactions.

This is the area Hameroff and Penrose are currently exploring. Micro tubules are tiny quantum computers.

My guess is that Roger Penrose might be interested in the Chaim Tejman M. D. theories on Wave Theory and their connection to the origin of life?

http://www.sciforums.com/threads/chaim-henry-tejman-m-d-wave-theory-and-the-origin-of-life.164134/

 

[river]

Are plants conscious?

Yes

More than Humans , No

Seems they are. They are aware of light for one. What causes plants to process the direction from whence the light comes. How does a plant acquire Heliotropic abilities? How about response to chemicals? How about response to sound?

Plants . Light is there very being . Without light plants would not exist . So for plants to be aware of light is not a surprise .

 

[river]

From Write4U ,

How does a plant acquire Heliotropic abilities? How about response to chemicals? How about response to sound?

Evolution .

 

[river]

From Write4U ,

How does a plant acquire Heliotropic abilities

Such as , roots .

 

[river]

What , what Heliotropic abilities ? What are these abilities ? Give an example .

 

[Write4U]

From Write4U ,
Such as , roots .

No, leaves have evolved heliotropic abilities.

Heliotropism is a growth movement in plants that is induced by sunlight. It is sometimes called solar tracking, a directional response to the sun. Because plants react in a similar way toward artificial sources of light, heliotropism is sometimes termed phototropism, a growth movement induced by any light stimulus.

Plants that orient their leaves to receive maximum sunlight are called diaheliotropic. Diaheliotropism is the tendency of leaves or other organs of a plant to track the sun by turning their surfaces toward it. Tracking the sun maximizes the amount of direct solar radiation received. Diaheliotropic movements can increase radiation interception, enhance photosynthesis, and increase growth rates of plants.

Plants that move their leaves to avoid sunlight are called paraheliotropic. Paraheliotropism is a plant response to minimize surface exposure to the sun. By orienting leaves and other plant organs parallel to the sun’s rays, light absorption is minimized. It is a process that some plants use to reduce dehydration by reducing leaf temperatures and water loss during times of drought.

http://lifeofplant.blogspot.com/2011/03/heliotropism.html

Heliotropism is a proto form of evolving sentience sentience.

 

[exchemist]

My guess is that Roger Penrose might be interested in the Chaim Tejman M. D. theories on Wave Theory and their connection to the origin of life?

http://www.sciforums.com/threads/chaim-henry-tejman-m-d-wave-theory-and-the-origin-of-life.164134/

No chance. The guy is a physicist.

 

[exchemist]

No, leaves have evolved heliotropic abilities.

http://lifeofplant.blogspot.com/2011/03/heliotropism.html

Heliotropism is a proto form of evolving sentience sentience.

What? You back here again? I thought you'd gone for good.

But I suppose the nutcase forum gets a bit tiresome after a while.

 

[DaveC426913]

Heliotropism is a proto form of evolving sentience sentience.

No it isn't.

To be defined as life at all, any organism must be capable of sensing and responding to outside stimuli. It's one of the fundamental criteria.

Your 'sentience' is an overreach.

 

[Write4U]

No it isn't.

To be defined as life at all, any organism must be capable of sensing and responding to outside stimuli. It's one of the fundamental criteria.

Your 'sentience' is an overreach.

Did you miss the term "proto"?

What would you consider as the very first proto type response to outside stimulus? How about navigation? Cilia?

There is no leap from chemical action in response to outside chemical stimulus to bio-chemical action in response to outside kinetic stimulus. It's all a matter of evolved sensitivity, via natural selection.
IMO, just like abiogenesis, consciousness is an evolved property. No irreducible complexity.

Seems you are talking about conscious response to outside stimulus, but that's a whole different story.

Sentience

is the capacity to be aware of feelings and sensations. The word was first coined by philosophers in the 1630s for the concept of an ability to feel, derived from Latin sentientem (a feeling), to distinguish it from the ability to think (reason).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentience#: