# A smartphone analogy to explore the origin of animals

## TL;DR

The paper compares how animals evolved from single-celled organisms to how smartphones evolved from existing technology.

## Contribution

A new model for animal origins is proposed, comparing it to smartphone innovation through repurposing of existing components.

## Key findings

- Animal origins involved integrating and repurposing pre-existing genes, not sudden new ones.
- The model suggests a novel 'operating system' drove animal evolution, similar to smartphone development.
- This framework provides testable predictions for biological innovation.

## Abstract

How animals evolved from their unicellular ancestor is a fundamental biological question. The fact that all animals are monophyletic—sharing a single common ancestor—implies their origin from unicellular eukaryotes was likely driven by rare and highly advantageous innovations. While the fossil record and initial genomic comparisons suggested animals originated by the rapid acquisition of many novel genes, new research on animal’s closest unicellular relatives reveals most of those genes originated before animals evolved. Here we present a new model for animal origins, which shares similarities with the origin of one of the greatest technological innovations of our time: the smartphone. We show that the origin of both animals and smartphones was due to the integration and repurposing of pre-existing components driven by a novel “operating system”, rather than the sudden emergence of many new parts. This model offers testable predictions and a new theoretical framework for understanding complex biological innovation.

A new model for animal origins sharing similarities with the origin of smartphones.