Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Having fun with Gregor Mendel

Can two parent plants with green peas have offspring with yellow peas?
When I tried the experiment the two green pea plant parent did not make a yellow pea plant children. The reason why I say this is because when I experiments with two green pea plant parents the outcome was not with a yellow child. The yellow trait was not in the family. Therefore, two green pea plant parents cannot have yellow offspring. My experiment is my support for my answer.

Can two parent plants with yellow peas have offspring with green peas?

When I tried this experiment the outcome was that there was one green pea child. The child was wrinkly when the other children and parents were not. Therefore, two yellow parent pea plants can have a green pea. My experiment is my support for my answer to your question.

Basic Genetics-Homework

Two thing I learned about heredity in the article you gave us is that children look like their parents because in the process of making the baby the dad and mom give one set of their chromosomes. We have 2 pairs of chromosomes, we get them from our parents, therefore they look like their parents in different ways. I also learned that since the parents give the chromosomes randomly each child has different sets. Its makes the child unique.

Two things I learned about traits in the article you gave us is that we are unique in our own ways because of our traits, traits are passed down from generations. Some examples are physical traits like hair and eye color. I also learned that the trait can be changed for example if you stay out to long then your hair color can change or when your behavior changes in the environment you are in. Heredity and your traits are what makes you unique in your own way.

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Class Response for Science

http://www.nps.gov/yell/naturescience/elk.htm

The topic is about Yellowstone National Park. We learned about the food web and all the animals in that park. This one in particular is about the elks and the introduction of wolves. Something that I have learned in class is that there are many elks living in Yellowstone National Park, before when the wolves were taken away the population of the elks was raised. Later on the wolves came back. "More than 30,000 elk from 7-8 different herds summer in Yellowstone and approximately 15,000 to 22,000 winter are in the park". In the article one of the topic is Other Influences on Yellowstone's Elk Populations, it says, "Computer modeling of population dynamics on the northern winter range predicts that 75 wolves would kill 1,000 elk per winter, but that elk would be able to maintain their populations under this level of predation, and with only a slight decrease in hunter harvest." I say this statement is true, because wolves eat elks and since there is more population of elks, the wolves main food would be elks, I also think that elks would be able to maintain there population because it all matters on their food and the hunting people do. The food web is the main reason for all the animals there. Every animal counts on the food web, so its a good thing the wolves came back even though they aren't safe, they make the food web complete. In the article is says that the wolves eat the moose, bison, deer, and even one pronghorn antelope in the national park. Therefore, in class we learned about the food web and Yellowstone National Park and how the wolves were back in Yellowstone and how the population of elks was raised. We have learned a lot about Yellowstone and the animal life there, there are many facts and some are listed above.


Second Current Event for Science

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2009/1125/3

This article is called Why Suffocating Is Scary it is by Greg Miller. This article was posted on November 25, 2009. This article says if you breathe to much carbon dioxide then you can suffocate. I agree with this article, the reason why I say this is because neuroscientist John Wemmie and colleagues at the University of Iowa experimented on mice and they found a protein in particular abundance in the amygdala, the brain's fear center. This showed mice lacking gene for this protein. When the colleagues injected carbon dioxide in the mice froze up, which is not a good thing. They also discovered that breathing more carbon dioxide can make the tissue more acidic. Which is very dangerous.That is the reason why I believe that this article is true. I agree that if you breathe to much carbon dioxide then you can suffocate and eventually die, I have the colleagues of the University of Iowa to support me. I will defiantly try not to smell carbon dioxide because I don't want to die.