Gene initiators become visible in sequence and silent memories through reminders
About 500,000 DNA variants informed a model that predicts gene initiators. In fruit flies, a memory that appeared forgotten returned after an appropriate reminder.
Science··Night
The model finds the signal in about 60 per cent of human genes
A University of California, San Diego team tested about 500,000 variants of the initiator, the region marking where a genetic instruction starts being read, with high-throughput sequencing. A machine-learning model extracted the sequence signature from those experimental data. The Genes & Development study reports that about 60 per cent of human genes carry the element. Researchers say the model strongly predicts whether an initiator is present in a gene. It recognises sequence features; it does not directly show how a mutation changes gene reading inside a cell.[1]
An apparently forgotten fly memory returned after 1 to 2 hours
A Friedrich Miescher Institute and University of Basel team paired an odour with a mild electric shock in a T-maze. The memory in fruit flies faded within 1 to 2 hours and appeared forgotten. When the same odour was presented without the shock in the original training chamber, the memory returned; a misleading reminder could distort what came back. Genetic tools that silence or activate selected neurons, alongside calcium imaging in the living animal, indicate separate active and silent traces. The findings cannot be transferred directly to human memory.[2]
The two experiments tested hidden signals differently
In the DNA study, half a million variants were tested in the laboratory before the model learned a sequence pattern from the data. In the memory study, behaviour, selective neuronal interventions and calcium imaging tested the same silent trace. The first predicts initiator presence without measuring the outcome inside a cell; the second alters recall in an animal model without establishing a result about human memory. Each source therefore makes an otherwise hidden biological signal accessible while its experimental system defines the limit of the conclusion.[1], [2]
