Radio-Mimetic Chemicals

For mankind as a whole, a possession infinitely more valuable than individual life is our genetic heritage, our link with past and future. Shaped through long aeons of evolution, oru genes not only make us what we are, but hold in their minute beings the future – be it one of promise or threat. Yet generic deterioration through man-made agents is the menace of our time, ‘the last and greatest danger to our civilization.’ Again, the parallel between chemicals and radiation is exact and...

 Genes are Under Constant Attack

Every animal and plant genome is subject to a constant bombardment of deleterious mutations: a hailstorm of attrition. It is a bit like the moon's surface, which becomes increasingly pitted with craters due to the steady bombardment of meteorites. With rare exceptions, every time a gene concerned with an eye, for example, is hit by a marauding mutation, the eye becomes a little less functional, a little less capable of seeing, a little less worthy of the name of eye. In an animal that lives i...