Applied%20Genetics

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Applied Genetics

• Selective Breeding and Genetic Engineering

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Selective Breeding

• crossing of plants or animals that have
  desirable traits to produce offspring with those
  traits
• Increased strength
• Leaner meat (less fat)
• Disease resistance
• Larger grain/fruit
• Better taste

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hybridization

• crossing two organisms (same genus/species,
  kind) with variations of particular trait(s) to
  produce offspring with a mixture of the trait(s)

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• Offspring inherits traits of both parents
• Donkey X horse mule
• Modern grains corn, wheat
• Ancient wild wheat X wild goat grass nutritious
  hybrid wheat used for bread

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• The greater the difference between kinds
  (genus/species) being hybridized, the more likely
  the hybrid will be sterile

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Hybridization

• McIntosh X Red Delicious
• Empire

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Inbreeding

• crossing 2 organisms that have the same or
  similar trait(s) to produce animals with the same
  trait(s)
• Idea is to preserve the desirable traits

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• Organisms are genetically similar and can lead to
  negative consequences
• Increased chances of inheriting disorders
• Increased chances of contracting certain diseases
• Decreased ability to adapt to environmental
  changes

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Interesting Hybrids

• liger cross between lion
• (father) and tiger (mother)

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Interesting Hybrids

• Tiglon cross between male tiger and female lion

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• Beefalo/cattalo bison x cow

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• Hinny
• Female donkey x male horse

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Cama male camel x female llama

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Cloning

• A clone is an organism that has the exact same
  genes as the organism from which it was produced.
• African violet
• Sheep
• Pigs

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Genetic Engineering

• Process in which genes (sections of DNA) are
  taken from one organism and transferred to another

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Recombinant DNA

• Section of DNA is separated from strand of one
  organism
• This is spliced into the DNA of another organism
• DNA is now combined
• Modified DNA will cause cells to carryout
  processes in a different way

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Products resulting from genetic engineering

• Medicine
• Insulin, human growth hormone (produced by
  altered bacteria)
• Hepatitis B vaccine (produced by altered yeast
  cells)

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Potential problems

• Cross-pollination of GM crops to wild varieties
  can cause weeds to become herbicide resistant
• Insects may become quickly resistant to
  insecticides because of exposure to GM crops

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• Predators that eat insects who have eaten GM
  crops can be affected in unknown ways
• People who eat GM crops can be affected in
  unknown ways
• Toxic effects
• Allergic reactions
• Resistance to antibiotics

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Warnings

• Genes are now known to control more than one
  trait
• By altering/changing a single gene, multiple
  traits may be changed in ways we cant predict
• Human genes are only a small percentage of the
  information contained in DNA (5 or less)we
  dont know what most of the rest does

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The Future.

• Chimera organism or component composed of
  different genetic material

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• So far
• Pigs with human blood
• Mice with human brain cells
• Sheep with human tissues in hearts livers
• Fusion of human rabbit bio-matter produced
  chimeric embryos

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Learning About Human Genetics

• A genome is all the DNA in one cell of an
  organism
• The Human Genome Projects goal is to identify
  the DNA sequence of every gene in the human
  genome
• 20,000 to 25,000 genes
• Finding the exact location and function of each
  gene could take decades!

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DNA Fingerprinting

• Hair, skin and blood can all be used to make a
  DNA fingerprint
• No 2 people have the exact same DNA
• A DNA finger print consists of a series of bands,
  something like a bar code.
• DNA finger prints can be used to show whether
  people are related, identify people and solve
  crimes.

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• Humans have only 300 more genes than what are
  also found in mice
• This tells me genes cant possibly explain all
  of what makes us what we are.
• Craig Venter, president of Celera Genomics
  (Maryland firm that led one of the mapping teams
  for the Human Genome Project)