Biology

Recently there has been news that Craig Venter has made an artifical life form, but so far all of the articles come directly out of the mainstream media, and so far there really is no details about the experiment. Instead they dove right down to implications without explaining what they actually did. Also, I can't seem to find it anywhere in major scientific journals. Here is one such article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/oct/06/genetics.climatechange Here they at least go over some of the details, and it doesn't seem like that they really created an artifical life form, rather they just took some existing chromosomes and modified it somewhat, which is …

Is it fair to say that a virus is not alive as it cannot perform basic activites needed to stay alive?

Looking for ideas to discuss or simple experiments to perform in my high school biology class. We're doing evolution right now, so anything along that line would be good. Any suggestions? Thanks.

I was merely curious if anyone had a link to information regarding the approximate number of atoms in a normal cell, a normal chromosome, and a normal adult human body. A ballpark estimation within an order of magnitude is all I'm looking for. Thank you.

One of the arguments I have encountered in relation to life on other worlds relates to extremophiles. Extremophiles are organisms that live in extreme environments - usually bacteria or archaeans. They may be found in hot thermal vents, extreme pressures, extreme cold, extreme pH limits, extreme salinities, or even at extreme depths under the Earth's crust. The argument is that, if life on Earth can live in such extreme conditions, then we can expect it to be widespread on other planets, under those extreme conditions. Life on Earth seems to be able to survive anywhere there is liquid water. Can life be found on other worlds anywhere there is liquid water?…

I've been told by a couple of farmers that some dogs will have bloodlust if they kill and eat the flesh of certain animals. I think one of the animals described was a collie eating some lamb (or maybe it was sheep). I was told that if it kills and tastes the blood of one of them, it gets the temptation to kill and eat the others. Does anyone know about bloodlust within animals? I tried finding something on Wikipedia, but not much information was there.

Do you think that habits as expressed by an organism say such as a human have a cellular/molecular undertow in the idea they aid in defining actions for systems of such.

During what stage of meiosis does the following apperar: a. Ogonium b. Ovum c. Diploid Reproductive Cell d. Haploid Reproductive Cell I want to say they all appear Meiosis 2 but if someone could check my answer. Thanks

I have two questions and not sure about the answers Give the number of chromosomes in the matured spermatozoa? I want to say the answer is 46 chomosomes In human, give the number of chomosomes in the spermatogonium? Not to sure about this one Can anyone help me please!!!! THANKS:confused:

I was designing an experiment to do in my intro bio lab on the effects of acid rain on crop yields and realized that I had no idea how to create aqueous solutions of various pH. I can't seem to find out whether pH is the measure of [H+]/[H3O+] (whichever you prefer) ions per mole, milliliter, or other measurement. When I came upon this I felt slightly embarassed that I did not know it, but upon consultation of my textbook and the internet, I found I could not find an answer. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

In general it is accepted that oxidative stress is involved in cell aging and especially in mitochondrial damages. However a recent publication by Ristow and colleagues in cell metabolism challenges this view. Abstract: Increasing cellular glucose uptake is a fundamental concept in treatment of type 2 diabetes, whereas nutritive calorie restriction increases life expectancy. We show here that increased glucose availability decreases Caenorhabditis elegans life span, while impaired glucose metabolism extends life expectancy by inducing mitochondrial respiration. The histone deacetylase Sir2.1 is found here to be dispensable for this phenotype, whereas disruption…

I think it's so stereotypical and stupid that life has to be cellular to be considered life. I think viruses are alive.

I wanted to start a new topic based on the question whether biology training of biologists is worse than that of other natural sciences. Generally I would argue that it is largely dependent on the university/institute, however the question arises, whether there are intrinsic features common to all biology student courses. Phil (thanks for the correction, Paralith) gave the following points: I would argue that it largely depends on the uni. I have been in three different (German) universities and institutes so far. In two of them we (the teachers) created our own courses from scratch and wrote our own scripts. Mine were notoriously feared as I usually set the dif…

I need help to figure out a method of obtaining a DNA fragment containing the full coding sequence for human rhodopsin. Also does anyone know how you would determine the number and size of rhodopsin transcripts in the human retina?? I have found out that the human retina has 3 rhodopsin transcripts sized 2.8,1.9 and 1.5kb. can someone tell me about the mechanism that produces these and what the functional significance might be??? Thx In advance

I saw on a dirty jobs episode where this company made vitamins by placing agae in salt water and leaving it in direct sunlight. The algae then started to turn red. The company supposedly got vitamins out of this stuff. Doess anybody know what I'm talking about, cause I wasnted to try this out for myself?

I'm taking BIO 121 right now and I'm just skiming through my book and notice this: NH2=amino R=20 different things COHO=Carboxyl Now, when I look at a table of the "R" groups bonded to the protein. It shows the Amino group as being +NH3. In the polar and charged groups this makes sense, shows that something in the R group is -. Meaning the Electron just moved. However this doesn't make since in the acidic state, because it has to give off electrons. I'm a little confussed, so enlighten me.

In species that use sexual reproduction, the female has a full normal complement of chromosomes, the male has an almost normal complement with a single non-matching pair. These are the sex chromosomes. In the female, these are a normal matching pair of X chromosomes, with the usual double copy of each gene. The male has an XY pair of sex chromosomes, with no double copies (genes from the Y only are expressed and lead to the development of male physiology). So the male seems to be a specialization of the female (apologies to the book of Genesis). This is further corroborated by observations that, in many species the male has a specialized role. In some, e.g. the lion, …

i really need help with this biology question: An experiment was carried out to determine the effect of temperature on the activity of an enzyme digesting the protien gelatin. The activity can be shown by the production of amino acids when gelatin is digested. the experiment at 45*c was continued for a further 7 hrs. at the end of this an additional 292mg dm-3 of amino acid had accumulated. calculate the mean production during the 10 hrs at 45*c. (at 45*c the rate of production of amino acid is 98mg dm-3). i would really appreciate it if u could help me out and also explain how u came up with the answer. Thank-you.

Do they necessary have to have quantitaitve values or can they sometimes be qualitative?? -Thanks

I am trying to contact either Hydroponicists or people that work with vegetation for a Science Fair Project. All I want is a few questions to be answered...very broad and general questions about hydroponics, nothing very specific. Thank you very much if anyone is able to help me either with the questions or find a Hydroponicist. Just please tell me if you are able to answer these questions, and I will contact you if you may be able to give me contact information. I spend a lot of time looking this up on Google.

Are GRHs able to be obtained by people who aren't plant company owners, if so, how expensive is it? Would it hurt planaria?

In my recent citizenship class, we were discussing the nature and use of subliminal advertising. The teacher gave us a common example of subliminal advertising in movie screens, in which a flash of an image appears for a tiny proportion of a second in a number of intervals. Here's a little extract from Wikipedia: It is clear that this strategy works, but it is in our subconscious mind that we notice these messages hidden within the movies, and our eyes pick it up, without us realizing it. Is there any sort of scientific reasoning for how this works? How our brain works in these situations?

can enzymes work on nonspontaneous (endergonic) reactions?

im trying to culture bacteria and im still new to biology, its for a mentoring program. i put my agar dishes in the fridge to keep them chilled but some of them froze completely solid. is it ok to use once it thaws? i havent put the samples on them yet they are still unused!

Hello. I am doing a required High School level Science Fair exhibit. I am planning on using this subject as the main focus. The problem is that I do not know whether electricity has any adverse effects on vegetation, and therefore I am not going to take any chances to see if it does anything or if it just sits there. So I am wondering whether anyone knows if electricity does anything to vegetation. I looked on google, and I am having a hard time sifting through the results. If no one can give me an answer, can someone please give me another reccomendation for a High-School Difficulty project? Thank you.