fandomhigh | Anthropomorphic Anatomy, Period 3, 1 Apr '09

"Much of what makes you who you are, what makes you human," started Mohinder, pausing to pick out something from the box of fruits on his desk. "And this banana a banana is hard coded in your DNA."

"It's not always as simple as picking out a single gene. That that one gave me brown eyes, one made her left handed and another gave him an allergic reaction to pineapple. For eye colour, brown is generally dominant over blue; black, red and violet are rare but possible variations, with at least six genes known to affect the shade you see in the mirror."

"Deoxyribonucleic acid is made of sequences matched pairs of nucleotides," he said, handing out notes. "It uncoils from it's helix into RNA, coding amino acids which form proteins which make up each of your cells. If there's a mutation, something going wrong can result in serious, even lethal medical problems."

Mohinder started setting up what looked mostly like an over-complicated blender. "DNA extraction is fairly simple," he said, picking up a swab. "Whether from yourselves or from fruit or vegetable. You all have instructions, so you can try your own extraction process."

[OCD has landed!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

With fruit.

Andrew Wiggin

Cal Stephanides

Liz Sherman

Sokka

Chris Halliwell

Listening, taking notes, thinking about ~~brains~~ lunch.

Listening to the lecture, Cal had a distinctly displeased scowl on his face. DNA. Genetics. Not always as simple as picking out the single gene that causes brown eyes, huh? What about how the mutation on just a single gene can take you from being a banana or a peach to a sick combination of both?

Cal might have been a little...disgruntled about DNA stuff. Just a bit.

Sokka raised a hand. "Once it's extracted, how do we grow it into clones?" he asked. "Can I use my DNA to make loud, opinionated talking vegetables?"

"Some fruit - like the strawberry - already is, and cutting and grafting a plant gives you vegetable cloning. Cloning yourself, well theoretically, injection into an egg, implantion and then you'd wait. Practically, it's a chancy, illegal procedure and the result probably wouldn't survive," Mohinder answered, then to the second. "Would you want to?"

There's a wide variety of fruits, and other equipment you might need.

Also how (http://kvhs.nbed.nb.ca/gallant/biology/dna_banana.html)-to (http://www.funsci.com/fun3_en/dna/dna.htm) guides (http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/labs/extraction/).

Edited 2009-04-01 17:49 (UTC)

Cal went about the experiment like he went about making stuff in the kitchen at Luke's. All he needed was a nice chef's hat.

And maybe a nice shot to the head so he could stop dwelling on how much he hated DNA.

It was Sokka, and science. What do you THINK happened?

He made a complete mess of everything, somehow managed to obtain a perfectly extracted sample of DNA anyways, and then some of the equipment caught on fire.

When he (and his genes) ping in.

Chris and his genes were totally there. The whole time. And on time even.

He's around, and has almost made an art-form out of studying genetics on a shoe-string and out of the back of a van, if anyone needs him.

No ending the world on Wednesdays.

And not a geneticist ~~though I do play one on LJ~~

Anthropomorphic Anatomy, Period 3, 1 Apr '09

Sign In 12 (AA)

Re: Sign In 12 (AA)

Re: Sign In 12 (AA)

Re: Sign In 12 (AA)

Re: Sign In 12 (AA)

Re: Sign In 12 (AA)

During the Lecture 12 (AA)

Re: During the Lecture 12 (AA)

Re: During the Lecture 12 (AA)

Re: During the Lecture 12 (AA)

Extract (AA)

Re: Extract (AA)

Re: Extract (AA)

Talk to the TA 11 (AA)

Re: Talk to the TA 11 (AA)

Talk to Mohinder 11 (AA)

OOC 11 (AA)