Nutrient-dependent Pheromone-Controlled Ecological Adaptations: From Angstroms to Ecosystems

Abstract

This angstroms to ecosystems model of ecological adaptation links nutrient energy-dependent epigenetic effects on base pairs and amino acid substitutions to pheromone-controlled changes in the microRNA/messenger RNA balance and chromosomal rearrangements via the physiology of reproduction in species from microbes to humans. The nutrient-dependent pheromone-controlled changes are required for the thermodynamic regulation of intracellular signaling, which enables biophysically constrained nutrient-dependent protein folding; experiencedependent receptor-mediated behaviors, and organism-level thermoregulation in ever-changing ecological niches and social niches. Nutrient-dependent ecological, social, neurogenic and socio-cognitive niche construction are manifested in increasing organismal complexity. Species-specific pheromones link quorum-sensing in microbes from chemical ecology to the physiology of reproduction. The reciprocal relationships of species-typical nutrientdependent morphological and behavioral diversity are enabled by pheromone-controlled reproduction. Ecological variations and biophysically constrained natural selection for codon optimality links nutritional epigenetics to the behaviors that enable ecological adaptations. All biodiversity is an ecologically validated proof-of-concept. Ideas from population genetics, which exclude ecological factors, are integrated with an experimental evidence-based approach that establishes what is currently known. Simply put, olfactory/pheromonal input links food odors and social odors from the epigenetic landscape to the physical landscape of supercoiled DNA in the organized genomes of species from microbes to man during their development.