Should We Learn About It?

2. a) How does meiosis introduce genetic variation into offspring? Think about how the chromosomes line up.(1 point)

Introduction: Genetics is the study of how genes and heredity combine to create traits in living organisms. Gregor Mendel disproved the theory that heredity comes only from parents. He discovered that there were dominant and recessive genes and his “Law of Dominance” has been used to selectively breed plants and animals for particular attributes. It has also been successfully adopted to identify the risk of passing down genetic diseases. Francis Galton took Mendel’s discoveries further by studying multifactoral inheritance and discovering ‘blending traits’, also known as continuous variation. With these traits, involvement of a wide range of genetic and environmental factors results in the creation of wide-ranging genotypes.

Inheritance involves passing genes from parents of offspring. In meiosis, the Principles of Paired Factors is covered in Prophase when it undergoes synapsis. The Principles of Dominance is the relationship between two alleles. The Law of Segregation is when two alleles will be separated from each other during meiosis. This happens when two copies of each chromosome will be separated from each other. When this happens the two alleles located on the chromosomes will separate from each other. During reproduction, alleles determine what traits are separated into reproductive cells by meiosis.

Purpose: The purpose of the genetic inheritance experiment is to show the understanding of how the reception of genetic qualities by transmission from parent to offspring work. Procedures: For the first exercise, I recorded the F2 seeding color. I recorded the frequency of green: white plants that will result in the F2 progeny.

Without diversity and variation among humans, the world would be quite monotonous. Although these disparities materialize on the exterior (e.g. hair color, eye color, widow’s peak, etc.) the authentic distinction lies deep within one’s genome. A genome consists of an organism’s DNA, thus providing the blueprint for growth and development (Moalem, 2014). Well-known physician, scientist, and author, Sharon Moalem expounded on the significance of genetics in one of his most prominent novels, Inheritance: How Genes Change Our Lives and Our Lives Change Our Genes. A myriad of biological concepts exist in this novel, all of which relate to genetics and the laws of inheritance. A few of these topics include: how genes are regulated/expressed, how a single change in DNA can alter the protein it codes for, and how ethics has an effect on genetics. These topics pertain to Big Idea 3: Living systems store, retrieve, transmit, and respond to information essential to life processes (CollegeBoard, 2015).

Briefly explain. These topics can include: Mendelian genetics, mitosis, meiosis, gene linkage, or the chromosomal basis of inheritance.

In the modern age, genetics, the study of heredity and inherited characteristics, is a rapidly developing field of science which has provided major advances in the

1. My moment of insight was during the family risk calculations lecture. I was confused when we calculated the carrier risk of individuals using a punnet square. My initial thought was that a carrier is someone who has the ability to pass an affected gene to their offspring. However, this is not entirely true. When making family risk calculations, a carrier is ONLY someone who is a heterozygote (one affected and one wild-type gene). This distinction is critical when making family risk calculations. I solidified my understanding of this concept when we compared carriers of recessive and dominant conditions. When considering a dominant condition, all carriers will also be affected. However, in recessive conditions, no affected individuals will

Petechuk, David. "Genetics." The Gale Encyclopedia of Science, edited by K. Lee Lerner and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner, 5th ed., Gale, 2014. Student Resources in Context, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/CV2644030980/SUIC?u=washington_chs&xid=427a06d9. Accessed 22 Mar.

Offspring differ somewhat from their parents and from one another. Instructions for development are passed from parents to offspring in thousands of discrete genes, each of which is now known to be a segment of a molecule of DNA. This essay will explore some of the reasons behind how and why these differences in appearance arise, from the base sequence of DNA through to the observed phenotype.

There are many issues today involving genetics and inheritances; therefore, I want to introduce this subject to students and allow them the opportunity to learn about it. Before students begin this genetics heredity unit they should have a basic understanding of DNA, cellular reproduction, and the process of mitosis and meiosis. Additionally, this unit will contain activities that require students to expound upon critical and higher order thinking skills; I believe these skills can prepare students for the kinds of issues they may encounter in the world in the future.

eye color to its sex. He found that females carry two copies of this gene,

Genetics is the study of genes, heredity, and genetic variation in living organisms. Genes are regions of DNA that code for the production of specific proteins. Genes are inherited from parents through sexual reproduction, also known as meiosis. Parents have two copies of each gene, also known as alleles. These alleles can be dissimilar in the amount of protein they code for (“What are Dominant and Recessive?,” n.d.). During meiosis, chromosomes can cross over and exchange genetic material within these alleles. This creates genetic diversity within a population.

When it comes to genetics, one must look at a combination of things that have us reach an understanding. The first major combination is what we learn when we visualize chromosomes. If we had never seen a chromosome, we still would be able to gather a sense of genetics. Since we have seen chromosomes, this gives a more definite idea of genetics, in the narrowest sense. The second combination of ideas is with chemistry. It allows us to define systems in a more precise term, and to expand at each level. We can see the actual chromosomes, their movements, their products, their changes, and their self-propagation regarding protein chemistry. The third combination that we look at concerns hereditary and development. These were brought together as aspects of the same problem of propagation and organization in two types of structures, the nucleus, and cytoplasm. The fourth combination resolves the conflict of biometry and Mendelism, and continuity and discontinuity (Farrall). This is related to activities of the chromosomes appearances of continuous and discontinuous variations regarding size and specificity of genes and proteins produced (Farrall).

Genetics is a field of biology, which concentrates specifically on the study of genes, heredity, and genetic variation among living organisms. The use of genetic knowledge can be traced to early civilizations when people examined and altered genetic information to advance the efficiency of domesticated species of plants and animals. Some of the plants, such as corn, wheat and rice, were genetically modified not only to increase the production of crops, but to also be resilient against diseases and pest, while at the same time still producing a nutritious and healthy harvest. About one hundred and fifty years ago, Gregor Mendel observed heredity through his experimental work on the production of pea stocks. Mendel came up with groundbreaking conclusions over eight years and with the use of twenty eight thousand pea plants as he discovered dominant and recessive genes to be the major building blocks of heredity while incorporating mathematics to identify patterns in his experiment (Wilson, Avery, Ford, Hancock, Read, Stephens, and Young, 2007). Mendel carried out monohybrid and dihybrid crosses and was able to obtain offspring in certain ratios that allowed the establishment of the laws of inheritance.