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Team:UST Beijing
From 2014.igem.org
Learn from ancestors.
An undesirable mutation deprived one of our beloved magics - providing vitamin C for ourselves. Fortunately, we might be able to pick it up from our ancestors.
Through evolution, we lost something.
Looking back at the footsteps of evolution, to gain any possible survival advantages, we human beings keep exploiting our limits and potentials to adapt to mercurial environment and harsh conditions. We have, however, lost some magical potentials in this process. The capability to generate vitamin C for ourselves is one of the lost magics.
Ancestors
Mutations in L-gulono-gama-lactone oxidase(GLO) gene in many vertebrate species caused the lack of expression of GLO, which leads to a loss of capability to produce vitamin C. As a result of this mutation, many species including human being developed their dependence on food source vitamin C.
We Human
Vitamin C has been playing a pivotal role in scavenging free radical and collagen synthesis. People with long-time insufficient ingestion of vitamin C, sailors for instance, could suffer from scurvy disease. To make matters worse, accumulation of free radical could be an important factor of aging.
Solutions?
The truth is, we lost the ability to provide an indispensable vitamin to ourselves. And here's what we are working around: can we find out a way to reactivate GLO gene and express functional GLO, hence pick up our long-lost magic? We've conducted cell-level experiments and evaluated their possible effects.
The answer is fusion.
Lemur catta，also called Lemur, is a kind of monkey and one of the two species of anthropoids with full and functional GLO gene. Lemur could be a good source of GLO gene if intend to regain our capability of producing vitamin C, just like our ancestors. However, there's still a long way to go.
