Re: OT: Goatweed and Lysimachia (Taxonomy)

> Chris, you sound like a taxonomist already. I took a Taxonomy course in
> Botany several years ago and only scratched the surface.  I wonder if
> they are doing anything these days with DNA to classify plants?

WARNING!  Scientific, possibly boring (but fascinating to me) information
to follow about DNA classification of plants.

Stephen Wolfram (my past boss) was doing research on this kind of thing,
and he's actually been working on a book about it called 'A New Kind
of Science.'  Unfortunately, he's also an unbearable man to work with,
suffering from an inflated ego and tunnel vision -- so my information
about his research 1.5 years old (when I decided to move to NCSA instead).

Anyhow, Stephen's really big on cellular automata.  Cellular automata is
the binary representation of growth patterns -- think of the old computer
game of life.

Stephen always wondered how a tiny strand of DNA could contain so much
information about an organism -- the complicated form of a leaf, spirals
on a seashell, etc.  He theorized that the DNA strand was comprised of
many mathematical formulas, each defining a pattern of growth in the
form of a mathematical procedure.  For example, think of the Mandelbrot
set (there's a sample image at

   http://www.cnam.fr/fractals/mandel2.html

).  That entire image set is derived from the single mathematical
procedure

   z_0 = z
   z_k = z_k-1^2 + z_0,  k = 1, 2, 3, ...

Look at the complexity of those graphics and the simplicity of the 
formula above!  

Using the Mathematica software package that Stephen pioneered, he's
been figuring out what the various formulae are for certain patterns
viewed in nature.

In fact, his latest work has been plant-related.  As he finds various
formulas, he tries to find similarities between them.  Using this method,
he's developing a classification system for plant parts (although he's
focusing on foliar characteristics instead of reproductive).  

So I suppose that this is more of a classification based upon the 
theoretical constructs of a DNA strand, but interesting nonetheless!

Chris
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@mallorn.com with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE PERENNIALS
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index