Evolution of Cats

        10.8 million years ago in Southeast Asia is where the story of the common cat we know of today, starts. Though today there are 37 different species from the Felidae, and these make up 8 lineages, things weren't always this way. Through evolution cats have kept a few basic types of characteristics such as skills at catching prey, being fast, dexterous and having five important weapons, which are there teeth and claws. The different evolution has made is it's definition and additions in skill and appearance in different types of cats. In a comparison to the average household cat the ancestors looked quite different. It was a cat that resembled a panther. It then split into a big species called Panthera. This family includes all kinds of cats like: lions, leopards, jaguars, tigers, snow leopards, clouded leopards and Bornean clouded leopards.Then the bay cat lineage came a little over 9million years ago. In this split was the medium to small type cats and they were limited to the forests of Southeast Asia. The the next split, 8.5 million years back, called the caracals. This split was defined as being an African cats, often golden in color with long legs and big ears. Continuing on to, eight million years ago, where the ocelot family is formed, these are cats the primarily reside in Central/South America. What sets them apart from other cats is that they have 36 chromosomes while other cats have 38. Then came the lynx, a little over 7 million years ago. Starting in North America what make the lynx a unique family is it's shortened tail and ability to widely disperse. 6.7 million years ago came the the puma lineage, this line that split into Puma, jaguarondi and cheetah. Soon after followed the leopard cat, which would after become more dominant in Asia. We come close to the end of the tale of cats, when a little over three million years ago is when domestic cats started to come into the picture. So then, 8-10,000 years ago in Isreal and Near East came the domestic cats as their own species. Even though sometimes hard to connect your household pet to a roaring, prowling predatory killing machine, we must remember and respect the path and evolution of cats.

Reflection on Sexual Education Unit

What did I learn during this unit?

      During this unit we studied Sexual Education, and I think we all as a class learned a lot. The first thing I learned was about how condoms are actually not completely the safest method of protection. They are only 60% effective, this is something I didn't know. I also learned about the different types of STDs. I had heard the names of different ones before, but never actually knew what they are. I think though, I am glad that I learned not only about what each kind of STD does but we also learned about how you can prevent STDs and how you can treat them. Also, while doing the essay for this unit, I picked the question where I had to research new developments in the world of STD testing. What I discovered during this process is that there is a new system of testing that can use your cell phone.

     I think my favorite part of this unit, was discovering how big a condom can become when blown up. We did this when we were learning about how to put on a condom. I not only think that was a fun lesson but it was also informational, and was a good lesson. I learned that you must leave a little bit at the top, to collect the sperm, and I also learned that you aren't allowed to keep the air inside the condom, because that could cause it to break. We now know how to open the package without tearing the condom and making a hole in it that can cause the sperm to come through during intercourse. To conclude, I think that this unit was educational and an important lesson for all adolescence to learn.

Relationships

      Today in Science we discussed what it means to be in a relationship and what are the differences between unhealthy and healthy relationships. The definition of relationship is;

1. The way in which two or more concepts, objects, or people are connected, or the state of being connected.
2. The state of being connected by blood or marriage.

      As you see in the first and second definition they both have one key word, connected, I believe this is what makes a healthy relationship. The ability to be connected on all levels, from your emotions to the actions you do. Other things I think that make a relationship healthy are factors such as, mutual respect, where the respect that you give to your partner is actually returned back to you. Trust, this is important, you must be able to trust your partner to be in a healthy relationship. Honesty, this factor goes along with trust, to be honest with your partner you must trust them, and honesty shows that there is no fear. Support, no matter what in a healthy relationship, partners should be there for one another. Fairness and equality, in no healthy relationship is one person superior to another, the power and responsibility must be spread equally. Separate identities, even though the partners should be connected, each one should be their own person. I believe these are the essential and fundamental pieces need to put together a healthy relationship.

      Yet not all relationships are like this, so what can a person do if they are in a situation that is perhaps abusive, unsafe or unhappy. Some signs of when a relationship has gone bad include, experiencing yelling and physical brawls in fights. If one partner is belittling the other. Also, if one partner feels the need to change for the other. These are only a few of the warning signs of a unhealthy relationship. All in all, if you ever feel forced to do something or are harmed in any way physically or emotionally, this is when the relationship has become harmful and you should seek help. What are some methods of finding help?  You can do a variety of things from talking a friends, family, teachers if you are still in school. Perhaps seeking professional help from those who are trained. There are also a variety of hotlines and online services that can be used. What is important though, no matter what the process, that the problem is resolved and that both partners are happy.

Bad Science Blogpost

       One day two researchers, Louis Jolyon West and Chester M. Pierce, in 1962, decided to test the effects of the drug LSD on Tusko, an elephant for nothing more then to just see the effects it would have on the elephant. Since they did not know the amount it would take to have an effect on Tusko so they gave him 3000 time the amount humans take, which is around 297 milligrams. Even though an elephant's weight in 90 times of that of a human, they didn't want to under dose him and that have to give him more. After the drugs were given to Tusko, he started running around his pen in circles, crazed. Then after he lost control of his movement, he started to have seizures and collapsed onto the floor. Yet even after they tried to counter the drug with an antipsychotic the attempts were useless. The seizures were reduced only slightly when Tusko then dropped to the floor and died. 


     This is an example of not only bad science but also blatant cruelty to animals. The experiment also proved to be a useless contribution the the field of science, it's not as if Tusko was somehow validated through the discovery of a cure for an illness, or something helpful to mankind, he simply died in vain. 


http://www.neatorama.com/2011/03/23/5-science-experiments-gone-wrong/

Onion Root Tips

Guiding Question: Approximately how much time do cells spend in each phase of the cell cycle?

To answer this questions we used a online activity that was a simulation. In this simulation we looked at pictures of cells that were in different stages of mitosis and had to classify them into Interphase, Prophase, Metaphase, Anaphase and Telophase. From looking at the amounts of cells that were in each category we were able to conclude that the phase that cells are in the most is Interphase, when they are a simple cell, and then one they are in the least is Telophase, which is where the chromosomes have split into their own separate cells.  In the table the amount of certain cells that were in a category had to be in number out of 36 and then a percent out of 100. To find the percents we took the amount and divided it by 36. From this we then got the different percentages.

Procedure:
Perform the onion root tip simulation and tabulate the number of cells in each phase. Construct an appropriate graph using your data to present the relative time a cell spends in each phase of the cell cycle.

 Conclusion: As we can see from the two pictures in this post we can conclude that cells spend most of there time in interphase and least of their time in telophase.

Regaining Eye-sight through Gene Therapy

      Three US citizens who all lost their eye sight as children, have gotten gene therapy to fix their eye problems, have reported life-changing results. Tami Morehouse, has recently talked about the joy she has experienced since getting gene therapy in both of her eyes. UK scientists and researchers are now saying that these treatments can maybe be used to treat other kinds of eye issues. All of these patients, have the same type of eye disorder, named Leber's Congenital Amaurosis. This rare genetic issue is inherited when a defect that encodes protein occurs and eyesight is effected. This disorder appears in the early stages of life, the symptoms that are shown with this disorder include very impaired vision, eye movements that are involuntary and very poor night vision. With this disorder, the cause is a mistake in more then 10 different genes. The effect of these abnormal genes is the retina does not function normally. Only a handful of people are being able to be treated by this new gene therapy treatment. The treatment consists of injecting one eye with the gene RPE65. Through this treatment the patients sight was improved, and in addition to treating the other eye their eyesight improved greatly. This discovery is important, because of the knowledge that we now know how to treat people for eye based issues through a gene based treatment that is not only safe but also successful.

Reflection on first part of Cracking the code of life.

1. Would you want to be tested to learn whether they  had a genetic disease or predisposition if no cure available? Why or why not?

I would still want to be tested for this genetic disease or predispositiosn because maybe starting with finding out whether this disease is in my body, so that if in the future there was a cure created that I would be aware that this would be helpful to me. Also, I believe that being informed is much better than not being, because this would allow you to be aware of the dangers your predisposition could carry.



2.  Would you want to have your DNA be part of a study? Why or why not? Would you want royalties for your part in finding the gene? What if during the testing, the company discovered you had a gene that might result in health problems later in life? Would you want to be informed ? Why or why not?
I would not be opposed to having my DNA be part of a study that could prevent people from falling ill and losing their life. Yet if I did I would not ask for anything, because it was just the matter I would have contributed and none of the true time and effort put in by the scientists that actually created the cure. Though if the company did find out that I might have health problems later on in life, I would definitely want to know about it. For the same reasons answered for the question above.

3. I think that keeping the public's genetic makeup private rather than public would help against any developing of genetic discrimination. Yet I don't honestly believe that genetic discrimination will become a very big problem, because there are bigger social issues plaguing society currently.

Empathy Gene

      According to studies, perhaps the reason why a person you might come across is more caring and kind that average could be because of there genes. There have been studies done previously, that showed links of traits to a certain gene variation. This gene the the receptor for a chemical made by the brain called oxytocin. This particular chemical has earned the nickname "love hormone" because of the role it plays expressing the feelings we feel such as anxiety, bonding and empathy. The division between the variates of the oxytocin chemical appear in the "G" and "A" variates. While people with two "G"'s tend to be better at socializing and are more confidant while the people who contain at least one "A" often have more mental health issues, are more likely to be autistic and find dealing with stress hard.

      I found this article to be interesting because I always thought that the kindness we express, and the kind of person you are, or empathy is something that has to be taught while growing up. I believed that the level of kindness and caring depended on your surrounding environment. So I was quite intrigued when I read that the level and willingness to express feeling and emotions to people is wired into to your DNA. 

Mendel's Pea Experiment

Gregor Mendel was a monk from Central Europe, he gave us the modern understanding of how genetics work. One of Mendel's famous experiments is one that he did with peas. Mendel took one green pea plant and crossed it with one yellow pea plant, his hypothesis was that the resulting offspring would be a yellow-green pea plant. Yet the result of his experiment was that all the offspring of the 2 pea plants were yellow! Thinking that he had made a mistake in the experiment, Mendel repeated this experiment many time, but he got the same result every time. Mendel then bred the first offspring generation (f1) and found that the second offspring generation (f2) had a ration of 3:1, which meant that out of 4 one pea was green while the rest were yellow. Looking at the experiment Mendel concluded from the f1 generation that the yellow gene was dominant and from the f2 generation that the green gene was recessive. This was not just relative to colour but to other traits as well. 

     In class we did a similar experiment where instead of growing our own plants, which would take a while, we took a bucket with a mix of yellow and black balls. From looking inside the bucket it was evident that the number of yellow balls exceeded the number if black ones. The test was to reach inside the bucket without looking and take four balls then record the number of black balls and yellow ones. At the end of our experiment after tallying up the results, we concluded that is the yellow and black colours were genes for a certain trait that the yellow gene would be dominant while the yellow would be recessive. 

       When conducting our experiment, we had to take a number of results because they varied each time. I imagine this is what Mendel must've done when working with the pea plants in his experiment. The test must've been repeated many times to ensure results that were adequate. This is the same for really any experiment, if the conclusion that comes out of the experiment, you wish to be accurate the experiment must be repeated a few times at least.
      To conclude, if believe we can agree that without Mendel's discoveries and experiments, that the modern understanding of genetics would be different from what it is today. 

Gattaca

I found the movie Gattaca very interesting. Not only was the idea that people could be discriminated because of the DNA they are born with, something, if it is natural, you have to live with it. In Gattaca it really doesn't matter if you have any other important talents or attributes what really matters is how your DNA results appear. While to whole idea of being able to "engineer" humans with certain DNA traits sounds fascinating, the idea that if your DNA is perfect you could be discriminated for it doesn't sound so promising. This is shown with the main character, Vincent Freeman. Being born with the DNA he has he is told that the probability of him developing a mental disorder is high, that he has a heart defect, his life expectancy is 30.2 years and is near sighted all because his birth was natural and not engineered unlike his brother. This in reality destroys any dream he was of making it to space. Unless he becomes someone else or a borrowed ladder, which is essentially becoming a 'valid' by borrowing their DNA. This is another interesting concept, asking us if taking samples of someones DNA and altering your appearance is all it really take to "become" this person. He buys this DNA from a man named Jerome, who is wheel-chair ridden after being hit by a car. Everyday Vincent must rid himself of his own cells by washing and scrubbing himself frequently and replace these with Jerome's. To get by screening Vincent also uses everything from hair, tissue, blood and urine samples from Jerome.  I found this movie to be quite thought provoking in terms of different kinds of discrimination within society while as well as teaching me about DNA, and how it shapes us.  It shows how Vincent's determination fights all the odds and he can eventually fulfill his dream.