Scientists have long known that the octopus is an extraordinary organism with a highly complex brain and cognitive abilities that are unique among invertebrate creatures. According to a new study led by the International School for Advanced Study (SISSA) in Trieste, Italy, the neuronal and cognitive complexity of these animals could originate from a molecular analogy with the human brain. The experts found that the octopus and human brain share similar transposons, or “jumping genes” – a type of genes that can move from one point to another of an individual’s genome, shuffling or duplicating.
Over 45 percent of the human brain is composed of such jumping genes. However, most of them lost their ability to move, or are inactive because they accumulated mutations over generations.
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“The discovery of an element of the LINE family, active in the brain of the two octopus species, is very significant because it adds support to the idea that these elements have a specific function that goes beyond copy-and-paste,” explained study co-senior author Remo Sanges, the director of the Computational Genomics Laboratory at SISSA.
