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Gremlinintheengine t1_iw5dd0s wrote

Reply to comment by SemogAziul in How do medical researchers obtain lab animals with diseases like specific forms of cancer which arise spontaneously? Do they raise thousands of apes and hope some eventually develop the disease? by userbrn1

How useful are fish in disease studies, really? Their physiology is so different from us.

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budrose13 t1_iw5owob wrote

Their physiology may seem very different from the outside but the genetic and molecular mechanisms are remarkably similar between zebrafish a humans. It's important to note that the vast majority of medical research is not "physiology" in the sense of studying whole organs or systems but rather molecular. So most research focuses on the genes and proteins involved in causing diseases and these are very similar between humans and zebrafish (about 70% shared genes). For example a gene that when mutated in humans causes heart defects may also cause similar defects in zebrafish (even though they have two chambered hearts while we have 4 chabered). If we mutate or remove that gene from the fish and indeed find that it causes heart defects we can use the fish to try to figure out how it causes those defects and potentially treat it.

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Roy4Pris t1_iw6im64 wrote

This is what aggravates me about nongs who don’t believe we’re related to chimps etc. Yes in the macro we look quite different, but at a metabolic and cellular level we are indistinguishable.

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playawhile t1_iw6x5zu wrote

It's almost like this DNA thing has some sort of... intelligent design behind all of it. Crazy.

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