Nicole+King

__Nicole King__ __Faculty member at the University of California, Berkeley in molecular, cell-biology, and integrative biology__ HOME TIME LINE 1986-2010 Nancy A. Morgan 1998- Thierry Lode Evolution of Evolutionary Thought Timeline Nicole King

Choanoflagellates- are unicellular organisms that have a tail like thing that they use to propel them selves and to collect bacteria to eat. To collect bacteria the tail swishes the bacteria in to the flagellum, which have little tentacles in the opening. When introduced to certain bacteria the Choanoflagellates start to form into groups. The certain bacteria is called RIF-1. The natural reaction when new cells are born is to split but when some RIF-1 is introduced it changes the natural reaction to make them stick together. This is what Nicole King is studying at the Collage of Berkeley. Nicole King and a group of scientist study the practicality of these organisms being the ancestors to animals. Choanoflagellates grow in colonies in the ocean. King was the first to be able to regrow these colonies in a lab. Choanoflagellates are at the bottom of the food chain and that makes them very important. Krill eats the Choanoflagellates and whales eat the krill, many other aquatic creatures depend one these little organisms or on the creatures the eat them. But these little creatures have been evolving for 600 million years and a group of choanoflagellates very well may have split off and formed in to a larger group of multi-celled organisms and this could have happened over and over again until we had a world full of organisms, that all evolved from a little single celled organism. King as studied the same group of choanoflagellates that she managed to grow at the beginning of her experiment.

References: @http://www.multi.fi/~rback/material/illustration/choanoflagellate.jpg en.wikipedia.org/wiki/**Choanoflagellate** @http://kinglab.berkeley.edu/ @http://mcb.berkeley.edu/index.php?option=com_mcbfaculty&name=kingn http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/08/06/bacteria-transform-the-closest-living-relatives-of-animals-form-single-cells-into-colonies/#.UPjKmI6sfR0