December 17, 2018 Monday
Bedtime Story
Constraints and Trade-Offs in Biology
Last night we were dealing with the
carnivorous plant Venus flytrap and its problem regarding energy expense with
no returns.
How should it minimize its loss of energy
in false-positive triggers?
Remember, in evolution (just like in
private economic enterprise) every organ than an organism possesses has to be
worth its cost otherwise the price the organism would pay or could end up
paying is its extinction.
In economics this subject is known as the
opportunity costs (also known as alternative cost) and what is applicable to
economics is also applicable for life since life is nothing special per se.
If an organism has “chosen” one particular
system to achieve its nutrition (which provides the energy needed to prevent
decay from entropy increase) it is then at the same time incurring a loss in
not choosing the available alternative.
If the alternative indeed is more
cost-effective then it will surely be picked up by other organisms which over
thousands of years will win over a lesser efficient and lesser cost effective
modality of food/energy procurement.
In biology the term that is more often used
is trade-off which is closely related to the idea of constraints.
In biology and microbiology it is often the
truth that a beneficial acquisition of one useful trait is linked to the
detrimental effect on some other trait.
One simple example is the trade-off between
fecundity and parental care.
Higher the number of off springs by an
organism and thereby higher its frequency the lower the parental care received by
each individual off spring.
The rules of the game are always the same
as the laws of physics (especially thermodynamics), chemistry and economics are
all pervasive.
So how does the Venus flytrap differentiate
an insect from say a drop of water?
Well, there could be many solutions to this
problem but the plant I guess had to come up with an answer or solution that
would require the least additional resources from the perspective of evolutionary
strain.
I mean in theory it could have developed a
visual sense but an eye along with the visual system is an extremely expensive
affair taking millions of years to evolve.
The plant decided to take the aid of number
sense that though not highly accurate is reasonably accurate dramatically
reducing the wastage of futile closures.
The tint hair triggers on the inner surface
of the leaves are triggered by any contact may it be an insect, a drop of water
or pollen from a neighboring plant.
But the leaves do not shut close at the
first trigger.
It waits for either that same hair to be
triggered in rapid succession (which “suggests” a struggling insect).
Stay tuned to the voice of an
average story storytelling chimpanzee or login at http://panarrans.blogspot.com
Good night Mon Ami and my fellow cousin ape.
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Another great educator and a teacher that I am aware of is
Professor Subhashish Chattopadhyay in Bangalore, India.
While I narrate stories, Professor Subhashish an electronic
engineer and a former professor at BARC, does and teaches real mathematics and
physics.
He started the participation of Indian students at the
International Physics Olympiad.
Do visit him here:
All his books can be downloaded for free through this link:
For edutainment and English education of your children, I
recommend this large collection of Halloween Songs for Kids:
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