Global Warming : Genetic Evidence

This post was written by a student. It has not been fact checked or edited.

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One of the biggest problems in this world is global warming, which is caused due to increase in greenhouse gas emissions resulting from fossil fuels. Scientists say that global warming will have a deep impact on the creatures living in this world and how they respond to it can be seen further.

THREE TYPES OF RESPONSES :

All living beings in this world defend themselves from climate change by presenting three types of responses.

1. Migration : There is migration from areas of increasing temperature to colder areas or from colder areas to hot temperature places. With the help of genetic markers( DNA segments) we can find that migration took place after the last glacial period and there are some evidences of migration after the middle Ice Age. Many migratory birds are modifying their migration calendars or eliminating them to adapt to the new habitat.

2. Acclimatization and Adaptation : The only difference between acclimatization and adaptation is acclimatization has changes only in the number of RNAs and proteins whereas adaptation consist of changes in both DNA and RNA and certain proteins. The changes in organisms due to climatic changes represent acclimatization. In the case of insects such as flies and mosquitoes, whose population have shown changes due to heat stress, heat shock or cell death apoptosis , even though there are polygenic changes.

The Arctic Thaw has given rise to hybridization, the Grolar, the mixture of polar bear and a brown bear, separated by the climate.

Till now global warming is not a strong factor to select genetic variations and produce real adaptation.

GLOBAL WARMING and DISEASES

Global warming can influence the dissemination of vectors of diseases such as flu, plague, malaria and even COVID 19. Genetics warn that in case of flu, may be related to decrease in population size and genetic variability of animals such as goose, ducks and other wild animals. It even raised the population of many bacteria and microorganisms ( for example, picoplankton).

Finally, genetically modified organisms can be used to fight against the effect of climate change and to recover deteriorated or altered ecosystems. But the existing species will be in danger, when more new species are introduced into biodiversity.

The most important fact is that we should keep our planet safe by reducing the emissions of carbon gases and by planting more trees, because all the living beings in this world are dependent on nature and we should not further endanger other animals living in this earth. We can't stop genetically modified animals created by climate change but we can postpone them for few centuries.