Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!uunet!ig!daemon From: bnevin@cch.bbn.com Newsgroups: bionet.molbio.bio-matrix Subject: Susumu Ohno reference Message-ID: <5888@ig.ig.com> Date: 14 Apr 88 17:00:21 GMT Sender: daemon@presto.ig.com Lines: 30 From: "Bruce E. Nevin" Anyone have a reference I can follow up for this intriguing story? January 1988 (AP) Bored with tedious mathematical equations, a Japanese geneticist, Susumu Ohno, decided to convert the genetic patterns of living cells into musical notation. He thought that listening to genetic codes, rather than staring at them, would make _patterns_ easier to detect. In this process he discovered that genes not only carry the blueprint of life, they also carry a tune. Translated into sheet music, a portion of mouse ribonucleic acid sounds like a lively waltz, very similar to Chopin's Nocturne, Opus 55, No. 1. The notes derived from the genetic codes are _not_ just random notes that some geneticists predicted [sic], but genuine music of the Baroque and Romantic eras, with an uncanny similarity to the works of great composers. Interestingly, the musical score derived from cancer cells sounds very somber, while the musical coding of the gene that gives transparency to the eye is filled with trills and flourishes, and is airy and light. Mr. Ohno said, "What I think is at work here are underlying principles that govern the structure of many things--a gene, a birdsong, a musical composition." What does this suggest about human pattern recognition, searching strategies, and matrix interface design? Bruce Nevin (bn@cch.bbn.com)