How the Zergs were Made

Chapter 23 Roots

The waves beat against the stone wall composed of columnar joints, then receded, and beat again, and this cycle went on and on. The earliest seabed and beach were formed through the interaction of seawater and rocks in this way, and it took tens of millions of years to form.

At this time, a discordant 'heterogeneous' was in the crevices of the stone wall, gradually, slowly, grasping the gap between the stone pillars, and climbing up the stone wall.

The shape of this 'heterogeneous' resembles the root system of a plant. From the main root, there are a lot of root hairs extending out. Through the molecular scale embedding, these root hairs can penetrate deep into the interior of this stone pillar even if it is the most solid stone.

In addition, while the roots provide fixation for the main root, they can also extract calcium, magnesium, iron, silicon, zinc and other inorganic elements from the stone pillar.

With thick stone pillars as the main load-bearing pillars, the root system does not need to worry about being torn off by the waves, and the main root extends all the way below the sea surface.

The source of the main root is a tumor-shaped mass, which also extends a large number of roots, firmly fixing itself between the ellipsoidal and pillow-shaped rock groups at the bottom of the volcanic island, resisting the erosion of sea water.

There is not only one taproot of the tumor-like mass, except for the one that is 'climbing', other taproots are climbing on the volcanic rocks on the seabed, spreading out in all directions, each extending for several kilometers, forming a lichen huge network.

It is hard to imagine that these things, not so long ago, were still a huge population of suspected animals.

"Huh... the design is finally completed, and the only thing left is to gradually 'construct' the work."

With his thinking separated from the work of 'design', Huo Gu only felt that his spirit was relieved, and he could finally take a breath.

If, as a human being, mental work was easier than physical work, it is now the reverse.

Huogu, who can't feel physical fatigue, relatively speaking, tedious and time-consuming mental work has become hard work.

All of these near the volcanic islands are Hogu's masterpieces, transforming the entire gourd group into the current plant-like appearance.

In terms of design, Huogu followed the structure of earth plant roots, and the surface layer is no longer the fragile epidermis that can be broken by stones, but a thick cocoon formed by superimposed construction of cell death.

In order to ensure the strength of the main root system, multiple rhizomes in the form of spider silk are entangled in everything, which can not only provide a strong supply function, but also ensure that no collapse occurs.

In the entire huge system arranged by Huo Gu, the tumor-like mass is the most core part, and the sensory cells of the entire gourd group gather here.

At the cost of sacrificing mobility, the influence radius of the life field directly expanded to about six kilometers!

Moreover, under the premise that there was no relay command at all, Huo Gu was surprised to find that the phenomenon of command delay was weakened a lot at once.

The veil of the mysterious life scene has thus become much thinner.

The rhizomes arranged on the seabed are to collect enough organic materials to meet the overall consumption, and the roots extending from the main roots can capture those organic materials well.

There are still a certain number of 'flowers' growing on the taproot on the bottom of the sea. These are the 'mouths' of the gourd at the beginning. Huogu didn't modify it, but transplanted it to the taproot intact, which looks like it grew out of it. flowers'.

Facts have proved that Hogu's idea is correct, these 'flowers' indeed brought him a considerable amount of additional organic materials.

What made it even more surprising was that it was still in the microorganisms and captured the gene samples of microorganisms with 'nuclei'. It is not an exaggeration to say that it is a surprise.

The importance of the development of the cell nucleus is an important milestone in the history of biological development, such as the first life constructed by organic macromolecules such as amino acids and proteins, and the establishment of civilization by the terrifying Homo erectus.

Its function is that the nucleus is the genetic information repository, the control center of cell metabolism and genetics. In other words, it can maintain the overall coordination of cells without the superconsciousness of Hogu.

Its existence means that unicellular organisms have the qualifications to develop and evolve into multicellular organisms.

"But this cell nucleus is still very crude..."

"It just has a simple double-layer nuclear membrane and nuclear pores, and there are no structures such as nucleoli, chromatin, and nuclear matrix."

"As far as it seems, this kind of nucleus can only play a role in defending against phage invasion to a certain extent."

Hogu summarized the information obtained from the genetic samples.

When he was interested, he committed an occupational disease. Huogu couldn't help but began to study this microbial sample with a nucleus.

"Nitrifying bacteria..."

In this way, it makes sense to capture this kind of bacteria in this vicinity.

At this time, the planet is full of active volcanoes, and the nitrous acid in the ocean is everywhere, especially near here, which is a volcanic island that is still in the active stage.

"Huh? By inhaling carbon dioxide and methane, reacting with nitrous acid, and finally expelling oxygen to maintain life activities?"

"What the hell?"

Huogu emerged again, the feeling that he had found the nucleus before, as if he had discovered a new world.

As we all know, carbon dioxide is an inert gas. Even on the earth, those plants that produce oxygen also need aerobic respiration to maintain normal life activities.

Oxygen is chemically unstable, so it is suitable as an additive to the reaction, not as a discharge after the reaction.

"etc!"

"I seem to have entered a certain misunderstanding. The chemical properties of oxygen are unstable. Isn't this a very powerful 'attack method'?"

Suddenly, with a flash of inspiration, Huo Gu, who had a little contempt for this kind of bacteria, suddenly put away his thoughts.

Oxygen itself can react with unsaturated fatty acids without enzymatic catalysis, and can destroy the phospholipids that store these acids, and phospholipids are the main components of cell biofilms, which eventually cause the death of microorganisms.

In the microbial world, the nitrifying bacteria captured by Hogu can be said to be quite terrifying 'poisons', no microorganisms want to approach them, especially in today's atmospheric environment, the evolution of oxygen-consuming microorganisms is basically impossible things.

"Sure enough, none of the creatures that can exist in nature are simple roles."

After admiring, the sample information was added to the gene sequence preserved by Huo Gu, and the nitrifying bacteria were digested to become nutrients for the entire cluster.

The law of the jungle is everywhere!

Under the transcriptional expression of the gene, the root core in the middle of the rhizome-like system extending several kilometers has the function of producing oxygen, with the purpose of killing microorganisms that may invade the rhizome system.

Of course, this is done just in case, to prevent the invasion of microorganisms after the skin defense line is damaged by stones.

With the power of microorganisms alone, the possibility of a positive breakthrough is very slim.