My great-aunt was a shark you know

I CAN DEFINITELY SEE THE FAMILY RESEMBLANCE... (PHOTO:NATASHAW)
I was on a trip in South America once, and was trying to spell my name to a ticket agent to buy a bus ticket. The poor woman got a bit confused in the hustle and bustle, and got my name wrong, writing down "Katie Jaws" on my ticket. Turns out she was prescient, because I am related to sharks. Well, according to ABC News Australia we all are actually.

Long ago in the ancient mists of time (450 million years ago to be exact), we shared a relative with our toothy friends. The elephant shark has some genes that are nearly identical to ours, meaning we have more in common with it than we do with other species closer to us on the evolutionary tree. We also have genes in common with mice and dogs, but that's not so suprising since we're all mammals. But we do have at least two things in common with sharks, so it does make sense these traits or characteristics would be expressed in our genes. For one, a shark's immune system is similar to ours, as sharks have all four types of white blood cells that humans have. The other thing we have in common with sharks is sex. Fish that should be closer to us on the evolutionary tree abstain from sex, preferring to keep fertilisation tidily outside the body. Sharks don't do this, and in case you hadn't noticed, neither do we.

Comments

[RPM]

Are you seriously surprised that we share a common ancestor with sharks? What did you think happened, both lineages poofed into existence in a moment of intelligent design a few hundred million years ago? C'mon!

"Fish that should be closer to us on the evolutionary tree abstain from sex, preferring to keep fertilisation tidily outside the body."

Fish that ARE closer to us evolutionarily have external fertilization. One common character does not a closer relative make (if you have brown hair, your father blonde, and your uncle brown, you are not a closer relative to your uncle than your father).

Sorry if I'm being an asshole -- sloppy writing in science reporting is a pet peeve of mine. The neat thing about what you're reporting are the highly conserved sequences, but that gets lost in the misphrased and poorly worded other stuff. Also, it would be awesome if you could track down where this research has been published (another problem with science reporting).

[Katie]

The research was published in Public Library of Science Biology. You can read it here:

http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371/journal.pbio.0050101

I wasn't suprised that we have a common ancestor, but I did find the story interesting.

I consider my wrists slapped and I will try and do better next time.