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Project Summary:
The California sea hare (above) is a type of hermaphroditic sea slug that has been used extensively in neurological, cognitive, and memory laboratory studies. It also releases a purple ink when threatened by predators (lobsters mostly). The dye is similar to the famous Tyrian Purple collected from the Murex sea snail which at one time was the most expensive color in the world.
The California sea hare's value, on the other hand, lies in its use as a laboratory animal. It's nervous system is extremely small, making up only 20,000 neurological connections and yet it has the ability to remember, learn, and problem solve.
The following 3-D printed models were predicted by Alphafold, a protein structure prediction AI developed by Google DeepMind (see attribution notes at end). These specific proteins are not yet known to actually exist but are predicted based on the organism's genome. In 2022, the Alphafold team uploaded models of 200 million protein structures from 1 million species, covering nearly every protein on the planet.
Alphafold represents the exchange between AI-led synthetic biology and IRL biology, forcing questions about the nature of reality and future evolutionary paradigms.
Exhibition History:
Temporary Friends, Disposable Lovers: A Digital Séance, curated by Hao Ni & Shell Curatorial, Chen-Yu Chen, Shiau-Peng Chen, I-Hsuen Chen, Melmel Chen, Li-Yun Chien, Jessica Hang, Jai-Yn Lin, Jia-Jhen Syu, Yun-Jieh Wu, Deng-Lin Yang, Bruno Aeberli, Jaimie An, Cristobal Cea, Nook Chuenkitti, Gail Dodge, Nadia Haji Omar, Kyle Hittmeier, Daniel Hüttler, Joel Kuennen, Bayne Peterson, Sivaan Walker. Massform, Xinbei, Taiwan, 2024.
Materials:
3-D Printed nylon, copper paint, aloe vera.
Predictive Protein Models Used
Ion Exchange:
Protein Name: NADH:ubiquinone reductase (H(+)-translocating)
Protein Name: NADH dehydrogenase subunit 6
Protein Name: NADH-ubiquinone oxidoreductase chain 3
Protein Name: NADH-ubiquinone oxidoreductase chain 1
Protein Name: NADH-ubiquinone oxidoreductase chain 4
Estrogen Receptor:
Protein Name: Estrogen receptor
Memory Suppression:
Protein Name: Memory suppression protein
License and attribution for Models:
Data is available for academic and commercial use, under a CC-BY-4.0 licence.
EMBL-EBI expects attribution (e.g. in publications, services or products) for any of its online services, databases or software in accordance with good scientific practice.
If you make use of an AlphaFold prediction, please cite the following papers:
Jumper, J et al. Highly accurate protein structure prediction with AlphaFold. Nature (2021).
Varadi, M et al. AlphaFold Protein Structure Database: massively expanding the structural coverage of protein-sequence space with high-accuracy models. Nucleic Acids Research (2021).
AlphaFold Data Copyright (2022) Google DeepMind Technologies Limited.
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