Re: Could human skin be photosynthetic?

On Oct 8, 10:41 am, Uncle Al <Uncle...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

3) Tell us how to power a photosynthetic animal without frying it
outright at any frequency, microwave to visible to Co-60 gamma.


Straw man. Why not also tell us how to create a complete eye
from one mutation? My point being that to receive some
incremental benefit, there's no need to power the entire animal
(e.g. vitamin-D production exists, even though it doesn't power an
entire animal.) If death by starvation is common among mammals,
then those which receive even a fairly small energy gain via
sunlight,
might squeak by while their non-photosynthesizing competitors
are selected out.

Of course the benefit could be so insignificant that it would be
too far down in the noise, and wouldn't be "noticed" and amplified
by evolution. And why are all of us not already like Euglenas:
both motile and green-skinned?

On Oct 9, 8:16 pm, Rock Brentwood <markw...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
It was stated elsewhere in the thread that the solar intensity is 1000
watts per square meter. I'm pretty sure that's only 100 watts per
square meter.

Nope, search on "solar constant.

If there is a way, nature would have found it by now.

That's what *I* said. The melanin discovery looks interesting,
and gives me an excuse for wild speculation about any other
common melanin-using organisms.

:)

((((((((((((((((((((((( ( ( (o) ) ) )))))))))))))))))))))))
William J. Beaty Research Engineer
beaty a chem washington edu UW Chem Dept, Bagley Hall RM74
billb a eskimo com Box 351700, Seattle, WA 98195-1700
ph425-222-5066 http://staff.washington.edu/wbeaty/

.

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