Question: What do you think is the most interesting/ important thing in biology?

Helen Frost answered on 12 Jun 2017:

Wowsers Amelia!! What a huge question!

That’s such a tough one to answer, but I’ll give it a go.

Something I find really interesting and important is the way that our body’s own defence mechanisms can go wrong sometimes. If we didn’t have the huge range of surveillance and checking processes inside our cells, then none of us would be alive today! Our bodies are amazing machines, which USUALLY spot mistakes and invasions, and can stop them in their tracks. For example, when our cells replicate (divide) there’s a chance that one of the two new daughter cells will have picked up a mistake in the genetic code (the DNA) while it was being copied. This happens on a regular basis, because we have so many cells which are dividing all the time. Most often, when this happens, the cell realises that something is wrong, and launches a process called ‘apoptosis’ or cell suicide. In other words, it shuts down and goes to sleep permanently, because that’s what will benefit you as a whole. Unfortunately, those surveillance mechanisms aren’t flawless, which is why in a tiny number of cases, a cell can slip through the net without initiating apoptosis if it has an error in the DNA. That’s when diseases like cancer can arise. So, through research, if we know how and why the surveillance mechanism failed, then maybe we can improve it in the future.