Regeneration

Sparked by the Mesa tech and Emily Alexander thread.

I keep thinking that SOMEWHERE, SOMEHOW the block to regen will be overcome. Mesa tech would certainly be one possibility. Continuing Beowulfian research is a better one.

For some strange reason, when first reading about the effects of the false potato (the not very toxic semi-edible native plant on Hades), I was convinced that an investigation of that would lead in this direction.

I have gone back and reread that story a couple of times, and I have no clue what I thought I saw that first time, but investigating weirdities is one way that science advances. The whole false-potato thing is very strange. Why should that plant in the whole Hades ecosystem (and, apparently, no other) be semi-edible? Investigation of that would be guaranteed to come up with something interesting (to a biologist, even if it doesn't do anything for plots).

False potato is almost certainly not the only somewhat-digestible plant on Hades. As with the Terran potato, it's probable that none of its near relatives produce the relevant compounds, but have no [human-] edible parts, so they wouldn't be of much use to anyone. It's not unlikely that another genus [or more than one] of the same family produces digestible compounds, but they may not have been found by any of the prisoners, or may be even more immediately toxic that the false potato. I would note that the parallel with the Terran potato is closer than many people may realise: all of our potato plant except the tuber is toxic - it is a nightshade, after all - and even the tubers are dangerous if they have been exposed to light and the skin is turning green.

Dathi wrote:Sparked by the Mesa tech and Emily Alexander thread.

I keep thinking that SOMEWHERE, SOMEHOW the block to regen will be overcome. Mesa tech would certainly be one possibility. Continuing Beowulfian research is a better one.

For some strange reason, when first reading about the effects of the false potato (the not very toxic semi-edible native plant on Hades), I was convinced that an investigation of that would lead in this direction.

I have gone back and reread that story a couple of times, and I have no clue what I thought I saw that first time, but investigating weirdities is one way that science advances. The whole false-potato thing is very strange. Why should that plant in the whole Hades ecosystem (and, apparently, no other) be semi-edible? Investigation of that would be guaranteed to come up with something interesting (to a biologist, even if it doesn't do anything for plots).

Sorry, hit Submit without getting to the point I really wanted to make: neurotoxins are a dime a dozen, so I'd be surprised if there were anything particularly new or informative about the false potato, at least on the regen front.

What has occurred to me - and I said as much quite a few years ago - is that the real breakthroughs will come in the process of developing it for non-humans. Comparing growth and regeneration mechanisms across biologies should provide a lot of insight.

Louis R wrote:False potato is almost certainly not the only somewhat-digestible plant on Hades. As with the Terran potato, it's probable that none of its near relatives produce the relevant compounds, but have no [human-] edible parts, so they wouldn't be of much use to anyone. It's not unlikely that another genus [or more than one] of the same family produces digestible compounds, but they may not have been found by any of the prisoners, or may be even more immediately toxic that the false potato. I would note that the parallel with the Terran potato is closer than many people may realise: all of our potato plant except the tuber is toxic - it is a nightshade, after all - and even the tubers are dangerous if they have been exposed to light and the skin is turning green.

Dathi wrote:Sparked by the Mesa tech and Emily Alexander thread.

I keep thinking that SOMEWHERE, SOMEHOW the block to regen will be overcome. Mesa tech would certainly be one possibility. Continuing Beowulfian research is a better one.

For some strange reason, when first reading about the effects of the false potato (the not very toxic semi-edible native plant on Hades), I was convinced that an investigation of that would lead in this direction.

I have gone back and reread that story a couple of times, and I have no clue what I thought I saw that first time, but investigating weirdities is one way that science advances. The whole false-potato thing is very strange. Why should that plant in the whole Hades ecosystem (and, apparently, no other) be semi-edible? Investigation of that would be guaranteed to come up with something interesting (to a biologist, even if it doesn't do anything for plots).

Except that the Havenites didn't do testing, and as far as we know neither did Honor, on "all" Hades flora and fauna. They did initial testing immediately upon landing, by both different parties, determied that more or less everything they've randomly encountered is NOT edible and called it a day.

There could very well be something that's also like false potato, and be semi-edible at least as far as not being actively toxic and thus a "filler" to help eke out real food; which is exactly what false potato did.


As far as the regen thing, it's a genetic condition brought about by the genengineering of colonists in the decades prior, and since I think it's around 9X% of the population is capable of regeneration, it's not classed as a big concern. It's even possibly that those poor genies incapable of regen are truly permanently screwed.


What I find far more remarkable, is that with regen people still flinch and are skittish about getting limbs shot off. From our perspective, regen is nothing short of magic, entire limbs capable of 'regrowing' in mere months. Regen basically turned everyone in Honorverse into a form of Deadpool, ala cutting his own hand off to avoid getting dragged off by Colossus. But the thought of losing a limb still seems to be pretty scary for them, even after the fact they shrug it off far faster.

Regeneration therapy is really only needed in cases of major traumatic level injuries such as losing a limb. The majority of the people that can not regen are never going to ever need it.

pnakasone wrote:Regeneration therapy is really only needed in cases of major traumatic level injuries such as losing a limb. The majority of the people that can not regen are never going to ever need it.

And of course, it just happens that two of our key players are affected by this condition. Three, depending on which parent Honor inherited it from (I'm betting Alfred, since he's the overt Genie). But we haven't yet seen what, if any, tricks and traps lie in Allison's genome.

Fox2! wrote:

pnakasone wrote:Regeneration therapy is really only needed in cases of major traumatic level injuries such as losing a limb. The majority of the people that can not regen are never going to ever need it.

And of course, it just happens that two of our key players are affected by this condition. Three, depending on which parent his or inherited it from (I'm betting Alfred, since he's the overt Genie). But we haven't yet seen what, if any, tricks and traps lie in Allison's genome.

I would be very surprised if Allison's genome had any sort of negative predispositions. Beowulf is the premier medical center, and the Beowulf Code and the Beowulfian ethos on genetic engineering does not prohibit genetic alterations to swap "bad" genes for "good" genes. IE, Beowulfian genetic engineering allows replacing the genetic predisposition for, say, nearsightedness, with a "normal" 20 20 vision predisposition, or removing a genetic predisposition for cancer.

Louis R wrote:False potato is almost certainly not the only somewhat-digestible plant on Hades. As with the Terran potato, it's probable that none of its near relatives produce the relevant compounds, but have no [human-] edible parts, so they wouldn't be of much use to anyone. It's not unlikely that another genus [or more than one] of the same family produces digestible compounds, but they may not have been found by any of the prisoners, or may be even more immediately toxic that the false potato. I would note that the parallel with the Terran potato is closer than many people may realise: all of our potato plant except the tuber is toxic - it is a nightshade, after all - and even the tubers are dangerous if they have been exposed to light and the skin is turning green.

Dathi wrote:Sparked by the Mesa tech and Emily Alexander thread.

I keep thinking that SOMEWHERE, SOMEHOW the block to regen will be overcome. Mesa tech would certainly be one possibility. Continuing Beowulfian research is a better one.

For some strange reason, when first reading about the effects of the false potato (the not very toxic semi-edible native plant on Hades), I was convinced that an investigation of that would lead in this direction.

I have gone back and reread that story a couple of times, and I have no clue what I thought I saw that first time, but investigating weirdities is one way that science advances. The whole false-potato thing is very strange. Why should that plant in the whole Hades ecosystem (and, apparently, no other) be semi-edible? Investigation of that would be guaranteed to come up with something interesting (to a biologist, even if it doesn't do anything for plots).

IMO it is unlikely to supply the ability to regen those whose profile won't allow it.

The solution acording to mesa would be to change the DNA profile of the offspring. In other words, don't find a way to give honor regen, tweek her genes so her kids can regen.

Fox2! wrote:

pnakasone wrote:Regeneration therapy is really only needed in cases of major traumatic level injuries such as losing a limb. The majority of the people that can not regen are never going to ever need it.

And of course, it just happens that two of our key players are affected by this condition. Three, depending on which parent Honor inherited it from (I'm betting Alfred, since he's the overt Genie). But we haven't yet seen what, if any, tricks and traps lie in Allison's genome.

It will only happen when and if the author requires it to, just like it was set up to happen because the author required it to. After all, we wouldn't want HH to be a Mary Superwoman.

In truth, regeneration may never even be a therapy so much as re-encoding genes so that they express the trait. That and the fact that we can already do very basic gene therapy even now suggests that in 2000 years we may have made some progress.

Truth to tell, this is the one aspect of the HH universe I dislike. It just feels like today plus one-hundred years*, but with faster than light space ships.

*Or 50 years or 200 years, but not 2000 years.

Keep in mind, in the HonorVerse much of this [regen, prolong, etc] are apparently fairly "new tech" coming out of Beowulf somewhere in the last century PD. Hamish father did not have it, he is 'first generation' as was Raoul Corvosier, etc. Honor is about a current generation and a half younger, and the techniques have progressed to "third generation", but science for 1/3 of the population of Sphinx (likely the Meyerdahl 1st Wave genies) have not got to the point where their genetics can handle regen.

But this is a "one generation" fix. Think about Allison's genetic "change" tech --> she created a nanite for Grayson's use that would destroy any ova with the genetic defect which was responsible for the out of whack birth ratio for male/female offspring. Once a "diagnostic nano" is created for Honor's subgroup that doesn't mess with the good stuff, that generation's children cannot receive the "problem DNA", and the problem ends. Granted, Allison's fix was to the ova, so I am not sure how that fix would be introduced if the anomaly is transmitted through the father. However, for HH, Emily, etc. that same "fix this which is broken at the cellular level" for already born individuals is far less likely, and probably impossible.

That said, as a real-world parent, I'd gladly invest in the tech which made sure that any future descendants of mine could not pass on a genetic disease to their progeny. Thoughts?