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Biology

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Write ONE paragraph respond/feedback to EACH answer. Please don't forget to put references (See below)

 

1.) Phylogenetics is the study of biological entities in respect to their evolutionary relationships, based on how genetic sequences evolve and change. Both nucleotide and protein sequences can be used to classify organisms based on specific conserved regions within their genome and create phylogenetic trees to illustrate the relative distances between species and the evolutionary process that took place. Among the many aspects of the phylogenetics system and its applications, it can be applied to forensics, identifying pathogens, and the classification of all organisms (EMBL-EBI, 2022). 

Clinically speaking, there are many applications of phylogenetics and ways to medically apply the information gathered through the process of investigating and classifying sequences. One potential use of phylogeny is to identify the origin of an outbreak or pandemic. For example, because HIV is a rapidly mutating virus, it accumulates many genetic markers to craft a detailed phylogenic analysis. Phylogenetic analysis has been used to trace back certain cases of HIV to a Florida dentist back in the 1990's, and to introduce a hypothesis that HIV was introduced into Africa through the polio vaccine, a theory which was later proved false. Another example of tracing the origin of viruses was seen with the SARS epidemic, which was able to be traced quickly by comparing it to a virus found it bats (Nesse and Stearns, 2008). 

Another important use of phylogenetics is to use genetic information known about a disease to predict the spread of future viruses and which strains will likely need vaccines to combat them. Information like that can help scientists and public health officials design vaccines before the viruses created widespread epidemics (Nesse and Stearns, 2008). For example, molecular phylogenies has been used in studies of malaria, African Trypanosomes, and Neisseria meningitidis strains and how antigenic variation gives rise to immunity evasion. This enables scientists to predict where and when infection will develop and thus prepare viable treatments in advance (Hartfield et al., 2014). 

 

 

 

2.) Evolution plays a vital part in infectious diseases, contributing to changes in the pathogens over time. Whether the pathogen has evolved into being drug resistant or has increased its infectiousness. We can notice this with the current infectious disease that has caused an epidemic, the COVID-19 virus. There is a program called MicroGMT that is used to identify and characterize mutations in microbial genomes. (Gu et al., 2021) This program will help understand the location of the mutations and possibly help countries put effective travel restrictions into place to control outbreaks caused by variants. We can see the evolution of `this virus through its mutation creating new variants. The interesting part of this virus is when it infects an immunocompromised patient the mutations will increase because it stays longer in the patient's system creating more possible variants. Genetic mutations can create variants that are more infectious or can cause more serious symptoms to occur which we can see from the Omicron variant and Delta variant.

Patients that slowly develop neurodegenerative diseases, scientists notice a progressive loss of certain groups of neurons. Evolution of neurodegenerative disease, it's important to understand the evolutionary part of genes and proteins associated with neurodegeneration. Genes that encode these pathological proteins can cause inherited forms of these diseases or can lead to genetic risk factors. (Cookson, 2012) We can see the evolution of neurodegenerative disease by analyzing the dysfunctions that related to the mutations associated with these diseases. (Cookson, 2012) For Parkinson disease, scientists have shown the MAPTgene is a risk factor gene for this disease. Genetic mutations that are associated with inheriting Parkinson disease involve a tandem triplication or duplication of the gene that encodes α-synuclein. (Cookson, 2012) The evolution of the population has influenced genetic mutations which has shaped degenerative diseases.