Basic Genetics with Awesomehighlighter

[Sean Nash]

Today's challenge is twofold: 

1. Select an article in the area of basic genetics to highlight, review and share here in the thread below.

2. Learn a new tool (awesomehighlighter) that helps to facilitate independent learning in any subject area.  This tool is really simple and effective for taking apart rigorous text and saving it in an online space for further review and/or sharing with friends and colleagues.

[josh steltenpohl]

The article i chose was, "Mendelian Genetics", from NDSU.

My highlights are:

http://awurl.com/LkeLC9Nf4

[Amanda Dixon]

think is my LINK


my highlight from the above article are as followed

Through the selective cross-breeding of common pea plants (Pisum sativum) over many generations, Mendel discovered that certain traits show up in offspring without any blending of parent characteristics.

Mendel's observations from these experiments can be summarized in two principles:
1. the principle of segregation
2. the principle of independent assortment

the principle of segregation, for any particular trait, the pair of alleles of each parent separate and only one allele passes from each parent on to an offspring. Which allele in a parent's pair of alleles is inherited is a matter of chance. We now know that this segregation of alleles occurs during the process of sex cell formation (i.e., meiosis )

principle of independent assortment, different pairs of alleles are passed to offspring independently of each other. The result is that new combinations of genes present in neither parent are possible. For example, a pea plant's inheritance of the ability to produce purple flowers instead of white ones does not make it more likely that it will also inherit the ability to produce yellow pea seeds in contrast to green ones.

[Terra Younger]

This is the site that I chose to use as my Awesomehighlighter article.... & here are some of the important things that I highlighted from my article...

-To make it easier to chart inherited characteristics, geneticists use capital and lower-case letters to identify the traits.

-If the alleles for a trait are exactly the same, that organism is called homozygous.

-A organism which has two different genes in the pair for a particular trait is said to be heterozygous.
(In heterozygous pairs, the capital letter always precedes the lower-case letter.)

-The trait that is evident in the appearance of the organism is called a phenotype.
phenotype = physical characteristic remove genotype = genetic make-up.

-Because some genes are neither dominant nor recessive, both alleles of a pair may be evident in the phenotype. This is called incomplete dominance.

-Even your sex was determined by a gene. The male sex chromosome is called the Y chromosome; the female is the X chromosome.

-Some human characteristics are called sex-linked characteristics. The genes for these characteristics are located on the X chromosome and are recessive.

[Shandis Cruz]

I reviewed two AWESOME ARTICLES!
Article 1 is called "The Gene School"
Here are my highlights:
• Genetic information is organized into structures called chromosomes
• The more chromosomes a species has, the more developed it is.
• Humans have 46. Chromosomes work in pairs; therefore, each human cell has 23 pairs of chromosomes.
• Chromosome contains hundreds, sometimes thousands, of smaller pieces of information called genes.
• Genes determine characteristics
• Ge• Genetic information is organized into structures called chromosomes
• The more chromosomes a species has, the more developed it is.
• Humans have 46. Chromosomes work in pairs; therefore, each human cell has 23 pairs of chromosomes.
• Chromosome contains hundreds, sometimes thousands, of smaller pieces of information called genes.
• Genes determine characteristics
• Gene is the blueprint for a specific type of protein in the body.
• DNA is shaped like a coiled ladder called a double helix.
• Proteins are made of smaller units called amino acids
• There are 20 types of amino acids.
• Each amino acid is made up of three nucleotide bases found in DNA.

Article 2 is just AWESOME (Watch the videos) :)

[Sean Killin]

this is the article i picked to highlight


these are my highlights
Mendel made two innovations to the science of genetics:

1. developed pure lines
2. counted his results and kept statistical notes

Pure Line - a population that breeds true for a particular trait

Phenotype - literally means "the form that is shown"; it is the outward, physical appearance of a particular trait

Dominant - the allele that expresses itself at the expense of an alternate allele

Recessive - an allele whose expression is suppressed in the presence of a dominant allele

Allele - one alternative form of a given allelic pair

Allelic pair - the combination of two alleles which comprise the gene pair

Homozygote - an individual which contains only one allele at the allelic pair

Heterozygote - an individual which contains one of each member of the gene pair

Genotype - the specific allelic combination for a certain gene or set of genes

Mendel's First Law - the law of segregation; during gamete formation each member of the allelic pair separates from the other member to form the genetic constitution of the gamete

Monohybrid - the offspring of two parents that are homozygous for alternate alleles of a gene pair
Remember --- a monohybrid cross is not the cross of two monohybrids.

Dominance - the ability of one allele to express its phenotype at the expense of an alternate allele

[Aziz Siddikov]

3-D structure of bullet-shaped virus with potential to fight cancer, HIV revealed sciencedaily.com

More importantly, research has shown that VSV has the potential to be genetically modified to serve as an anti-cancer agent remove
"The special shape of VSV-- a bullet head with a short, helical trunk-- has lent to its evasion from three-dimensional structural studies." remove
Their data suggest that VSV assembles through the alternating use of several possible interaction interfaces coded in viral protein sequences to wind its protein and RNA chain into the characteristic bullet shape. remove
ur data clearly demonstrated that VSV is a highly ordered particle, with the nucleocapsid surrounded by, instead of surrounding, a matrix of M proteins," said lead study author Peng Ge, a visiting graduate student at UCLA from Baylor College of Medicine. remove
visiting graduate student at UCLA from Baylor College of Medicine. remove
The findings could help lead to advances in the development of VSV-based vaccines for HIV and other deadly viruses, according to the researchers.

This is from this site

[Kylie Warner]

My article i chose was Probability of Inheritance

My highlights are:

we can predict the likelihood of inheriting particular traits.

It can also help people explain and predict patterns of inheritance in family lines.

graphical way of discovering all of the potential combinations of genotypes

that can occur in children, given the genotypes of their parents.

It does not matter which parent is on the side or the top of the Punnett square.

determined

Which of the two parental copies of a gene is inherited depends on which sex cell is inherited--it is a matter of chance.

[Blayr Bolton]

The article I chose was "Introduction to Genetics." It's a very simple way to approach the basic ideas of Genetics. Enjoy!

Chromosome: A linear strand of DNA harboring many genes.

Gene: A unit of genetic information that occupies a specific position on a chromosome and comes in multiple versions called alleles.

Heterozygous: Having a genotype with two different and distinct alleles for the same trait. Homozygous: Having a genotype with two of the same alleles for a trait.

These results can be simulated with a Punnett square, a calculation device used to determine the possible genotypes of offspring given the genotypes of the parents.

The offspring's genotypes are then calculated by observing the intersection of the mother's and father's individual alleles (much like a multiplication table).

Dominant: An allele producing the same phenotypic effect whether inherited heterozygously or homozygously; an allele that "masks" a recessive allele.

Recessive: An allele producing no phenotypic effect when inherited heterozygously and only affecting the phenotype when inherited homozygously; an allele "masked" by a dominant allele.

Before Mendel's work, the most popular theory of inheritance stated that the qualities of the parents blended to form the qualities of the child. Under this theory, one tall parent and one short parent would produce a child of medium height.

Mendel's Principle of Segregation: The factors of inheritance (genes) normally are paired, but are separated or segregated in the formation of gametes (eggs and sperm).

[Miranda Lynn Stanton]

The title of my article was "Probability of Inheritance".

you put the genotype of one parent across the top and that of the other parent down the left side.

fill in the boxes by copying the row and column-head letters across or down into the empty squares

gives us the predicted frequency of all of the potential genotypes among the offspring each time reproduction occurs.

can be used as predictive tools when considering having children.

If both parents are carriers of the recessive allele for a disorder, all of their children will face the following odds of inheriting it: 25% chance of having the recessive disorder 50% chance of being a healthy carrier 25% chance of being healthy and not have the recessive allele at all

If one parent is a carrier and the other has a recessive disorder, their children will have the following odds of inheriting it: 50% chance of being a healthy carrier 50% chance having the recessive disorder

If only one parent has a single copy of a dominant allele for a dominant disorder, their children will have a 50% chance of inheriting the disorder and 50% chance of being entirely normal.

likelihood of inheriting many traits, including useful ones, can be predicted using them

possible to construct squares for more than one trait at a time

[Hannah Rush]

This link was the site that I decided to use for this project..

Using the awesome highlighter, this is what I decided was important to remember from the article.


certain traits show up in offspring without any blending of parent characteristics

However, the dominant yellow allele does not alter the recessive green one in any way. Both alleles can be passed on to the next generation unchanged.

one allele passes from each parent on to an offspring

the principle of independent assortment explains why the human inheritance of a particular eye color does not increase or decrease the likelihood of having 6 fingers on each hand.

:)

[Taylor Woodruff]

The article I chose was The Basics on Genes and Genetic Disorders, from kids health

The highlights from the above are as follows:

human body have 23 pairs of chromosomes, making a total of 46. Individual sperm and egg cells, however, have just 23 unpaired chromosomes.

male child receives an X chromosome from his mother and a Y chromosome from his father; females get an X chromosome from each parent.

Genes are sections or segments of DNA that are carried on the chromosomes and determine specific human characteristics, such as height or hair color

every person has from 25,000 to 35,000 different genes, there is an almost endless number of possible combinations!

[Sean Grinstead]

GENOTYPE
The genes present in the DNA of an organism (ex: Tt or YY or ss, etc.)
Each letter represent genotypes for one particular trait, every offspring gets two codes (two letters). Two capital or two lowercase letters in the GENOTYPE (ex: TT or tt) it's called HOMOZYGOUS
When the GENOTYPE is made up of one capital letter and one lowercase letter (ex: Tt) it's called HETEROZYGOUS
ex: TT = homozygous Tt = heterozygous
PHENOTYPE = how the trait physically shows-up in the organism.
Examples of phenotypes: blue eyes, brown fur, striped fruit, yellow flowers.
ALLELES = alternative forms of the same gene.
There are three possible GENOTYPES - two big letters (like "TT"), one of each ("Tt"), or two lowercase letters ("tt").
when the parent plants had contrasting forms of a trait (tall vs short, green vs yellow, etc.) The phenotypes of the offspring resembled only one of the parent plants with respect to that trait. We use "allele" or "gene" instead of what Mendel called "factors".

The Law of Dominance
There is a gene in the DNA of pea plants that controls plant height (makes them either tall or short). One form of the gene (allele) codes for tall, and the other allele for plant height codes for short. For abbreviations, we use the capital "T" for the dominant tall allele, and the lowercase "t" for the recessive short allele.

The Law of Segragation
He takes two of the "F1" generation (which are tall) and crosses them and he gets some short plants. his new batch of pea plants (the "F2" generation) is about 3/4 tall and 1/4 short ( 1 out of the 4 plants is short and 3 out of the 4 are tall) the parent plants for this cross each have one tall factor that dominates the short factor and causes them to grow tall. To get short plants from these parents, the tall and; short factors must separate, otherwise a plant with just short factors couldn't be produced. The factors must SEGREGATE themselves somewhere between the production of sex cells & fertilization."

The Law of Assortment
Mendel noticed during all his work that the height of the plant and the shape of the seeds and the color of the pods had no impact on one another. In other words, being tall didn't automatically mean the plants had to have green pods, nor did green pods have to be filled only with wrinkled seeds, the different traits seem to be inherited INDEPENDENTLY.
Nine times out of ten, in a question involving two different traits, your answer will be "independent assortment".

This is the link to my AwesomHighlighter page.