Genetics

This article appeared in the UK times today. It interested me for several reasons: 1. Genetic changes caused by conditioning & training. 2. Possible reason why the female brain is smaller than the male. 3. Human brain size actually declining irrespective of sex. 4. possibility of an evolutionary trend we may not find welcoming. The ideas raised seem to relate to several past and present threads, not sure which one to put it in. Comments, observations? Please read all before replying, even if chosing only one aspect for response.

I think that this would be a lot better foray into genetic engineering than germline manipulation. How far away are we from seeing the effects of somatic cell engineering? What will the benefits of somatic cell engineering be? We we be able to make humans stronger or smarter or both? Anything else anyone would like to add. -John

I would like to propose a way to make a viable cell sort of from scratch. This is predicted by my hydrogen bonding equilibrium theory. It has never been done and we may not yet have the needed capability, but here goes. Here is what you do. First we start with a DNA double helix. Human will work just fine, since it has the most sophisticated genetic repetoire. We put this in beaker one. Step two, we make two long RNA strands from the DNA double helix to reflect the exact template relationships on both DNA helix strands. If the RNA breaks that is OK, because it will help the cause. We put this in beaker two. Next, we make two long stands of protein from the two strand…

I think its called a retro virus or something? Whats happened with that?

hia im a third year psychology student looking at the possibility of a gay gene. i go to university in london, the uk. i need as many men both gay and straight to fill in a quick questionnaire. all you have to do is email me at claireorrells93@hotmail.com and ill send it to you. please help a desperate uni student. also, i kinda need all the participants to be from the UK thanks claire

Should we find a way to make Eugenics work?

This is one of the most confusing conditions I have ever heard of. A person could go about their daily life, maybe not getting enouhg sleep and then everything can change at the drop of a hat. To be more precise everything can change by one of these triggers: car accidents, virus, bacteria, chemical, and certain emotional trauma. After one of these incidents a person's life is filled with a daily pain that goes through the whole entire body, food cravings or a lack of appetite, fatigue, stomach problems, unable to concentrate, etc.. I'm wondering if any of you guys could guess if there's anything connected in the triggers that could bring on something like this. Some doct…

Hello, I am posting here, hoping for ideas and feedback on how we can use the computer to 1) improve biomedical research, especially in cancer, and at the same time 2) reduce the use of laboratory animals. My professional background is that I recently started as a bioinformatic engineer in a cancer research institute. Biomedical science seems to be seriously hampered by the use of animal models, as Khalil writes in a recent article in Current view on Oncology: "Many of the cell lines and animal models used to study cancer mechanisms and test possible therapeutics are not predictive of what will happen in actual in vivo human tumors. The discrepancy between …

Sharks can regrow their teeth and numerous other animals have similar capabilities. Do you think it is possible for scientists to identify this gene in sharks then integrate those genes into humans so we can regrow our own teeth?

Like what will they look like in the future? Like predict a boy that is, say, 11 years old, and predict what will he look like 5 more years and stuff. Is there anyway?

hi, I'm new, so i'm not really sure if i should be posting this in here, but ill do it anyway. i am currently in high school, and i want to be able to get a job working for the government when i am older. i think i would enjoy working in the field of cytogenetics, but i am not sure where to start. can anyone recommend some good books, and tell me what classes i should take in high school and college? also, do you think this would be a good career choice? it seems like you would always have something to learn, and it would never get boring. i would really appreciate your help, and please, don't bash me if this is in the wrong section, just have a mod move it. thanks.

hello what do you think the oods are that in the near future we might have to concern or selfs with dna thieves? was discussing cloning with others when thought came up that with cloning could i in the future have dna samples stolen from someone else to create my own clone of them. such as i find a wanted a wife that look exactly like a certain actress, could i pay to have a sample of her dna taken for cloning purposes. adding in of course for some form of more quickly aging the clone. or a woman who wants a child by a certain man , clones him and harvests sperm from the clone to produce a child with herself. what would be the legal ramification of such a c…

Has 'genetically transmitted information' proven not to be the 'holy grail' most had been hoping for; particularly when it comes to behaviors? aguy2

Hi. could anyone help me with some revision/learning? I missed these lectures due to illness -- knowing these things would give me a good starting point for the solid revision: 1/where do tandem repeats come from? I know that they cause recombination misalinments, which can reslut in their elongation, but this only elongaes existing TNRs: what actually causes them in the first place? 2/is there any difference between the structural effects of trinucleotide repeats and tetranucleotide repeats? eg, mononucleotide repeats can cause bends in the dna helix, triNRs can cause complex dna structures (like hair pins etc)... am i right in assuming that any oligonucleotide …

If we look at the evolution of animals on earth, the path was slow until humans came along. After that, only humanity has evolved at an accelerated rate. For example, just in the past 50 years life expectancy has increased considerably. What makes humans different from animals are our minds. Animals reach a certain level of adaptation and don't progress their minds, unless there is a pertubation within the environment. New behavior and adaptation will eventually parallel with a genetic improvement. Humans, never stop adapting because we are always changing the environment, for example via culture. For example, animal behavior was a gradual process. When animals…

http://shop.wgbh.org/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10051&storeId=11051&langId=-1&partNumber=GHOST_WG36813 So what's the dilly yo?

So Avian flu, H5N1, had been in the news lately and is widely heralded as a large threat to humanity, similar in genetics and potential impact to the 1918 pandemic. Is Avian flu this much of a threat? Is this media hype gone overboard OR are our government leaders shunning a serious health risk? Also, what type of impact would avian flu have on humanity, how much damage would really be wrought (realistically)? Do we have enough vaccines? Personally, I think this is a risk but because of all the hype people are freaking out and therefore the governments are collectively saying "We should handle this before riots break out." So, in my view, avian flu isn't as m…

Scientists in North Carolina say they have identified a gene that affects IQ, a finding that, if confirmed, would be a significant step toward understanding the genetic basis for intelligence. The new research could also have ethical implications because the effect of the gene appears to be quite dramatic: The scientists say that as a group, males — but not females — who had the variant gene had IQ scores about 20 points lower than males who didn't. More here: http://www.azstarnet.com/news/105238

I don’t know much about genetics so forgive me if this question is futile, But lets imagine for an moment that on some distant planet somewhere, hydrocarbons (or hey why not other types of molecules) formed something similar to DNA and RNA, but not quite the same, but still being able generate something similar to life, just not life as we see it. Maybe their DNA is not a double helix and uses some other form to hold its genetic information? Maybe life can be made out of non-carbon based molecules? Perhaps that 'life' would have unimaginable characteristics… Sorry if this question is stupid, I just thought to myself why is it only DNA and RNA as we know it tha…

The project I'm working on now, on evolutionary divergence, is in a slow patch so I am going to try my hand at some Mendelian genetics while I wait. I've looked around at some articles and websites and I think I might know how to go about all of this, but I am still wondering if anyone has any tips for this. I can imagine this sort of thing is trial-and-error so I'm open to suggestions on how to proceed. Also, thought this website was cool for amateur genetics: http://www.bioservers.org/bioserver/ It's a cool website that let's you upload sequences and then analyze them for various things. Pretty nifty.

In my life science class we got divided up into pairs, and are making different DNA models. How detailed they are is dependant on our skill level. Cody and I are making a really detailed one, and it is suposed to show the molecular structure of ech of the base pairs, and the deoxyribos and Phosphate group. We are going to start building it after we get back from Thanksgiving break, but how owuld you show each molecule 3 dementionally?

guys wat is the diff between a chromrosome and a chromatid i think that durin cell division a the dna in the chromosome divides to form two chromatids. is this true pls tell me im realyy confused

I was thinking.....their is alot of debate about human cloning.....and....its pretty much...some people want it, and others do not. This is going way off subject, but, people are upset about how much oil cost, so why not try to clone it?....just my two sense...wanted to no what people thought on the idea...

Hi everyone...I'm new to this forum. If you think my questions are really dumb, please don't laugh at me...because I'm not that smart... I came across this problem about beta-lactamase cloning. Say, we're given an isolate of bacteria which has beta-lactamase gene and we want to clone beta-lactamase from this bacteria with the help of e.coli. what are the procedures involved? Is this correct?--> - treat the bacteria with restriction enzymes to cut the b-lac gene (but I don't know which enzyme is appropriate - shall I use restr-enzyme like HindIII, BamH1?) - choose a cloning vector. I'm confused at this part too, which plasmid to use? If I am not mistaken, E.c…

I was reading up on Vit. C and noticed that it isn't made naturally by us and one may see it as a genetic defect. Seeing how it has implications upon different types of neurotransmitters and hormones I was wondering if there are humans who actually have the ability to create Vitamin C within themselves. It seems that 1932 marks the date of the acknowledgement of Vitamin C so, it may be true that we haven't come across such humans yet, or else we don't know how to find them. What do you think would hypothetically happen if our genes allowed us to make Vita. C?