Nosh Conner

2/18/15 m/w/f class 11:30-12:30

Dr. Staab Principals of Biology
Bio in the News Review
While studying the worlds largest single celled organism, Caulerpa taxifolia, researchers
at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Canter in Saint Louis discovered that throughout its entire
structure different parts of the cell used different forms of RNA. Head researcher of the project,
Dr. Daniel Chitwood, expressed his enthusiasm in the news article about how much this new
study of Caulerpa could change his own views on his main focus of tomatoes. Daniel Chitwood
discusses his studies of the tomato and how difficult it can be to study a multicellular organism
or plant because there are so many different cells to look at within it. But as the team found out
through the Caulerpa, it was easier to look at the single cell whose organelles could be seen
much easier than any normal cell.
The news article itself gave a great introduction to what was to come in the scholarly
article as much a good interview piece with Dr. Chitwood. The article addressed all the key
points that would be touched in the actual scholarly article as well as a title that got the readers
attention. The only things that could have been done better are the fact that the news article tells
you where to find the scholarly article on a general website but does not say specifically and you
can get lost very quickly trying to find it on the website. Also the news article could have been a
little longer and should have talked a little more about how this research will benefit other
scientist; the article was great but it might have been too short to grab every readers attention.
In the research paper the scientist go into detail about the singled celled organism and
describes what it truly is. Caulerpa taxifolia is a six to twelve inch long plant algae. The

interesting part of this organism is that it has land plant characteristics even though it is only
found in the water. This is said to maybe a new evolution in the plant because of how large the
cell is, it needed these almost leaf like ends to survive. This was an amazing discovery and
with this raises so many questions for the scientist.
The lab reports main focus was on two things, the RNA and the leaf like stems. The RNA
being different in different parts of the Caulerpa is a huge step in a the biological community
because with this come the thought of, what if there are other cells with different forms of RNA
found right inside one cell? Frankly, our results have caused us to think about plant structure
from an entirely different perspective, which is the most important outcome from this research,
says Dr. Chitwood in the news article.
The other huge discovery is the fact that this single celled organism is growing the leaf
like ends. These ends show that this green algae has evolved to adapt to its environment
underwater and to provide itself a tool to obtain the sunlight it needs by giving itself as much
surface area as it can with its leaves just like a tree. Another big reason for this is because it has
never been seen before in a single cell organism, only in complex multicellular organisms,
meaning this is a big discovery that will be researched further later on. "Our work on Caulerpa
has given me and my team a whole new way of thinking about plant structure and development,"
said Dr. Chitwoood. These discoveries within just one study of the Caulerpa is the reason why
scientist do what they do, to make these new discoveries, these new advances in all fields; huge
discoveries such as this are the reason why our knowledge further increases about this world.