04-18-2024, 02:42 PM
This post was last modified 04-18-2024, 03:02 PM by Maxmars.
Edit Reason: Edit to add Updated info
OK... I'll apologize up front... I doubt many of you will find this as interesting as I do...
It seemed like something I'd never considered before. And like many, I have run across many videos, and articles about fractals in nature, with their many iterative graphic images in many colors, or demonstrated in plants and crystals...
From Science Alert: First Fractal Molecule in Nature Assembles Into a Sierpinski Triangle And We Don't Know Why
From the spiral arms of galaxies to microscopic snow crystals, nature seems to fall into fractal-like patterns that repeat in increasingly smaller increments. No matter how small you go, parts of the pattern still resemble the whole.
One exception appears to be molecules, which have not been known to exhibit self-similarity at changing scales. That is, until now.
Researchers from Germany, Sweden, and the UK have discovered an enzyme produced by a single-celled organism that can arrange itself into a fractal – not just any fractal, but a repeating pattern of triangles known as a Sierpiński triangle....
![[Image: sierpinski-molecule.jpg]](https://www.sciencealert.com/images/2024/04/sierpinski-molecule.jpg)
This is a conceptualization of the molecules... which can be better understood with the images below:
![[Image: sierpinski-molecule-body.jpg]](https://www.sciencealert.com/images/2024/04/sierpinski-molecule-body.jpg)
The underlying reason for the structure is only speculation and makes me wonder at what else we haven't seen in nature...
(EDIT TO ADD: Source article
From Nature: Emergence of fractal geometries in the evolution of a metabolic enzyme)
Fractals are patterns that are self-similar across multiple length-scales. Macroscopic fractals are common in nature; however, so far, molecular assembly into fractals is restricted to synthetic systems. Here we report the discovery of a natural protein, citrate synthase from the cyanobacterium Synechococcus elongatus, which self-assembles into Sierpiński triangles. Using cryo-electron microscopy, we reveal how the fractal assembles from a hexameric building block. Although different stimuli modulate the formation of fractal complexes and these complexes can regulate the enzymatic activity of citrate synthase in vitro, the fractal may not serve a physiological function in vivo.
About that, "the fractal may not serve a physiological function in vivo" I would like to think "that we know of," but then, I'm just a layman.
It seemed like something I'd never considered before. And like many, I have run across many videos, and articles about fractals in nature, with their many iterative graphic images in many colors, or demonstrated in plants and crystals...
From Science Alert: First Fractal Molecule in Nature Assembles Into a Sierpinski Triangle And We Don't Know Why
From the spiral arms of galaxies to microscopic snow crystals, nature seems to fall into fractal-like patterns that repeat in increasingly smaller increments. No matter how small you go, parts of the pattern still resemble the whole.
One exception appears to be molecules, which have not been known to exhibit self-similarity at changing scales. That is, until now.
Researchers from Germany, Sweden, and the UK have discovered an enzyme produced by a single-celled organism that can arrange itself into a fractal – not just any fractal, but a repeating pattern of triangles known as a Sierpiński triangle....
This is a conceptualization of the molecules... which can be better understood with the images below:
The underlying reason for the structure is only speculation and makes me wonder at what else we haven't seen in nature...
(EDIT TO ADD: Source article
From Nature: Emergence of fractal geometries in the evolution of a metabolic enzyme)
Fractals are patterns that are self-similar across multiple length-scales. Macroscopic fractals are common in nature; however, so far, molecular assembly into fractals is restricted to synthetic systems. Here we report the discovery of a natural protein, citrate synthase from the cyanobacterium Synechococcus elongatus, which self-assembles into Sierpiński triangles. Using cryo-electron microscopy, we reveal how the fractal assembles from a hexameric building block. Although different stimuli modulate the formation of fractal complexes and these complexes can regulate the enzymatic activity of citrate synthase in vitro, the fractal may not serve a physiological function in vivo.
About that, "the fractal may not serve a physiological function in vivo" I would like to think "that we know of," but then, I'm just a layman.
