The more we learn about biology and evolution, the more it becomes clear that truly innovative solutions to design problems are ancient and deeply embedded. Consider this recent finding:

In higher order animals, genetic information is passed from parents to offspring via sperm or eggs, also known as gametes. In some single-celled organisms, such as yeast, the genes can be passed to the next generation in spores. In both reproductive strategies, major physical changes occur in the genetic material after it has been duplicated and then halved on the way to the production of mature gametes or spores. Near the end of the process, the material – called chromatin, the substructure of chromosomes – becomes dramatically compacted, reduced in volume to as little as five percent of its original volume.

The molecule in question is a phosphorous molecule that modifies a histone. Histones are relatively small proteins around which DNA is coiled to create structures called nucleosomes. Compact strings of nucleosomes, then, form into chromatin, the substructure of chromosomes.

“This molecular mark is required at a critical time leading up to genome compaction in spores and sperm,” says Shelley L. Berger, Ph.D., the Hilary Koprowski Professor at The Wistar Institute and senior author on the study. “Also, there seems to be a similarity in the way the mark is used in organisms as different from each other as yeast and mammals, suggesting that compaction has been important throughout evolution.”