>>14301164They are a groupe of genetic elements which have or had the capacity to move about. There are generally 2 classes, DNA and RNA transposons, depending on how they move around. DNA transposons are cut out and pasted in elsewhere. They reproduice during cell devision. RNA transposons make an mRNA copy, which makes a bunch of new RNA copyes and those are pasted into your DNA.
These weird little DNA parasytes have proliferated, because they have various evolutionary benefits, basically they let you duplicated genes or move them to a new location or add new motifes or new regulators, new introns, new exons, etc... But on a personal level they suck, as they cause DNA damage and are the key cause of ageing.
The mobile ones are silenced by epigenetic means, but over time we lose that repression and they start moveing about, causing DNA damage, degradation of the proteome, cancer, neurological disease and they even play a part in late onset autoimmune disease. They also cause sterile inflamation.
So they do a bunch of weird shit and have a bunch of benefits for evolution and downsides for the soma. Curious little buggers, and i love researching them.
