Writing in Biology

Wolves (Canis lupus), coyotes (Canis latrans), and domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) are all separate species. Although there are times in which the species interbreed this is because of the fact that all of the species are similar enough. The article mentions that even modern humans today have some traces of Homo neaderthalensisas well as Denisova homininsgenes mixed in their genomes. The fact that they can interbreed with one another does not make them a single species. Their interbreeding occurs when there is not enough of one species in the area and what this leads to is more variation among the species. Although wolves, coyotes, and domestic dogs share very similar genes there still is enough variation to make them separate species. 

In ecology I am interested in a deeper perspective into the different levels of ecology. I would like to further investigate individual organisms, populations, communities, ecosystems, and biospheres and the relationships between each one. Ecology focuses on the relationships between organisms and their environments, so I look forward to studying topics such as mutualism, commensalism, parasitism, as well as looking at a single organism’s role within its environment. Similarly, I want to investigate further predation and competition between organisms and how these affect their niches within the ecosystem. Within the topic of populations, I believe it would be interesting to see how populations change and adapt overtime and how they are able to respond to different environmental pressures. It would also be interesting to look at how different types of ecosystems function systematically, and their abiotic and biotic factors, as well as specifically how humans have impacted these ecosystems. In a more broad spectrum, I am interested in the many levels of ecology because in order to reduce the problems the earth faces as a direct result of humans, we need to better understand the relationship between our ecosystems and the impact that certain human actions (deforestation, species endangerment, pollution, etc) have in causing our ecosystems to decline rapidly today.

    Obviously the loss of jobs due to automation is an inevitable problem, yet it makes me wonder why fast food chains like McDonald's or Dunkin Donuts don’t utilize automation to its maximum potential.
    For example, today I was in line at a Dunkin Donuts and all I had wanted to order was a donut with a coffee. If instead of people behind the counter we had machines instead, would that make the process go faster? Would it be cheaper for the business to have multiple machines (long term) make the orders and serve it instead?
    There is that cliche scene in movies and TV commercials of a rube goldberg machine performing tasks that would normally be done by a regular person, like washing the dishes or getting the kids dressed. Would it be possible to make that a reality in fast food places?
    Chains like McDonalds are already slowly getting rid of cashiers by having people order what they want on their own at a machine. Could it be possible to make a machine make the orders as well? Something simple like a burger or french fries are very simple to make. Why not make a machine that makes the order instead?
    In downtown Boston, there’s a place called Spyce where machines make the food, and there are no cooks in the place. Instead, the people behind the counter are people who are there to answer questions, and reload the machines in case they run low on a specific ingredient. From its reviews online, the place looks like it’s doing quite well and is a success. Why are more places not following suit?
    One of the reasons that come to mind, is the stigma that lies behind the idea of your food being made by a machine. I personally am a cook at a fine dining place, and I could never imagine a robot doing what we do at the restaurant. The food that comes out is imperfectly perfect every time, and it’s not picture perfect which could make the food seem almost unnatural. But something like fast food, I don’t see the problem with a robot making the food because it’s all very simple. It’s just a bun with meat and veggies with cheese, with some condiments and a bun on top. If anything, it’s possible that the food will come out looking even nicer than it usually does, because at least in American fast food chains, the food never comes out as nicely as it looks in advertisements.

The reason behavioral ecology interests me greatly is because there are so many different things that factor into it, and the wide range of things you can study. From environmental factors, to learned behaviors, the genetic variances, there are so many things that can determine why a certain organism lives and behaves the way it does. It would be interesting to see what the driving force behind certain behaviors are, and why it is better for the organism to live the way it does. Finding out if a certain way of doing something is better evolutionarily as a whole could tell you so much about an organism and the evolutionary pattern of that organism and its ancestors. The only way to study this would be by testing the success rate of different organisms in similar environments that act differently in similar situations. The behavior of organisms is, to me, that most interesting and variable part about ecology.

The reason behavioral ecology interests me the most because there are so many different things that factor into it, and the wide range of things you can study. From environmental factors, to learned behaviors, the genetic variances, there are so many things that can determine why a certain organism lives and behaves the way it does. It would be interesting for me to see what the driving force behind certain behaviors are, and why it is better for the organism to live the way it does. It would be interesting to find out if certain ways of doing things are better evolutionarily as a whole. The only way to tell this would be by studying the success rate of different organisms in similar environments that act differently in the same situation. The behavior of organisms is, to me, that most interesting and variable part about ecology.

Our findings show that as concentrations increase that does not mean that growth will increase. (Table 3) Also, it does not seem to correlate to how many flies are in the adult stage. (Graph 1) The life stages of the offspring do not seem to be accelerated by the growth hormone. This can be easily seen in graph 2 and 3. Graph 3 shows that only the one with the most hormone had larvae which doesn’t make sense with our hypothesis. Also, Table two shows that more pupae were in the tubes at the higher concentration levels. Inn graph 5 it shows that pupae made up a large amount of each fly grouping. It does seem however that reproduction rate increases when our group added 10 uM. This can be seen in table 1, there are much more flies overall than any of the other concentrations. Overall, more males than females were produced. (Graph 4)

My class that focuses primarily on epidemiology is using a cool ap that is run by the cdc. It essentially is an app that gives you data on an outbreak and you have to work through where the outbreak originated and how it originated. The one that I just completed was really interesting and a little tricky to figure out. It involved an anthrax outbreak, which with the facts presented looks to be a bioterror attack. The facts are very misleading though, it is a total accidental release of the anthrax bacterium into the air. A drum instructor took a trip to Africa and bought goat skins for making his drums. The drums weren’t properly cleaned off the anthrax that they had been exposed to. You later find out that he also failed to check the skins in at customs, so no one ensured that the proper cleaning process was completed in order to make sure the skins safe for travel. And just because someone didn’t register their possessions with customs no one checked to make sure there was nothing harmful on the skins. I think the point of the simulation is to show you that an outbreak can happen for any reason and outbreaks don’t know border limits. But most importantly the people working to find where an outbreak started don’t have an easy job and have to comb through thousands of pieces of data to ensure they know what pathogenic agent they are dealing with.

In 1869 Thomas Huxley proposed the theory that birds descended from dinosaurs. For a long time, however, the idea was widely unaccepted and it wasn't until the discovery of many specimens of feathered theropod dinosaurs such as Archaeopteryx and other like it which lived in the late Jurassic and thereafter that pushed the idea into the spotlight and allowed it to gain traction and support. The idea is now widely accepted and new fossil finds are providing insight into how small flightless feathered raptors became the incredibly diverse array of birds that share the Earth with us today.

As early as the mid-1800’s the theory that birds had descended from dinosaurs had been proposed but was widely unaccepted for some time. It was the discovery of feathered theropod dinosaurs like Archaeopteryx that pushed the idea into the spotlight and allowed it to gain traction. Now the idea is widely accepted and new fossil finds are providing insight into how small flightless feathered raptors became the incredibly diverse array of birds that share the Earth with us.

    Earlier today there was a video posted by this Youtuber I follow named Domics, called “Hypotheticals: The Wagyu Problem”.  The video basically describes how Dom (Domics’ nickname) went out to try A5 Wagyu for the first time, and how the cattle lived a luxurious life of 3 years before it was slaughtered for its meat.
    So then this hypothetical question popped up. “What if you were able to live a grandeur life for x amount of time, knowing that by the end of that time you would be killed humanely for your meat to be served for other people (assuming cannibalism is legal and a regular occurrence in this hypothetical)”.
    Some questions obviously popped up, like how many years can you live in this wealthy lifestyle, what’s the spending limit (if there is any?), could you spread the wealth, and how could they keep you from running away once the time limit is up?
    One question I personally had was would they be able to pick anybody for that kind of lifestyle program, or would it have to be a select group of people who get the option to live like that? If it is a select group of people, then how do they determine who goes and who doesn’t? I think there are lots of moral complications and issues with the hypothetical, but I think it’s an interesting question nonetheless.
    The video was basically just Dom and two of his friends talking about the hypothetical, and it was really interesting to hear the other perspectives. One of them said they would most likely subject to that lifestyle if their friends did it, while the other two (including Dom) said they would still abstain from it.     Personally I pondered about the hypothetical, and I have to admit I think I would not want to live that kind of lifestyle. In my opinion, I think you would need to feel very strongly about finding fulfilment from materialistic value, and I personally don’t have that. Even if all of my friends were to do such a thing, I still think I would abstain from that kind of lifestyle since the people I believe I would end up becoming friends with, would all abstain from that lifestyle as well.