Scientists have discovered that horizontal gene transfer, where genes move between different species, is not just common in microbes but also occurs in multicellular animals like cockroaches. This process involves genes from one species being incorporated into the genome of another, creating connections across the tree of life. In microbes, this is facilitated by their environment and lack of a nucleus, allowing DNA to mix easily. In contrast, multicellular animals were thought to experience this less frequently because foreign DNA must enter the right cell to be inherited. However, recent studies show that cockroaches have carried bacterial DNA for millions of years, highlighting the significance of horizontal gene transfer in evolution.
QUESTION: How might the discovery of horizontal gene transfer in animals change our understanding of evolution and the interconnectedness of life on Earth?
Cockroaches scurry around with thousands of pieces of bacterial genomes
