Drafts

Water plays a really important role in the life of a plant. It's interesting to compare and contrast the need for water between plant and animal cells. Surprisingly though, out of all the resources that a plant needs to flourish and function, water is the most plentiful but also the most limiting. This is because the actual availability of fresh water is so low. The availability can limit the productivity of ecosystems which leads to differences in vegetation type. Also, water is usually a limiting source for plants and not so much animals because plants use water in very large amounts and approx. 97% of the water evaporates that is taken in. Both cells ultimately survive on water and need it to prosper. However, a big difference that has a large impact on their water relations respectively is that plant cells have cell walls and animal cells do not. The cell walls allow the plant cells to build large internal hydrostatic pressures which is essential for physiological processes.

All facts stated can be found in the textbook Plant Physiology and Development (sixth edition) by Lincoln Taiz and Eduardo Zieger

In this experiment, we worked with tetrahymena thermophila. Tetrahymena are unicellular ciliates that feed on bacteria. They can reproduce sexually and asexually. They use cilia to sweep their food into the cells oral groove. (Bozzone, 1998, p. 347) For our experiment our decided to see what different volumes of serotonin would do to the feeding habits of the tetrahymena. The hypothesis we came up with for the experiment is: If we add increasing volumes of serotonin to samples of tetrahymena, then the rate of consumption of the tetrahymena will increase. We decided that this hypothesis was justified because the serotonin increases phagocytosis. (Quinones-Maldonado and Renaud, 1987, p. 435) Phagocytosis is the taking up bacteria or other materials. We believe this means that the consumption of the tetrahymena with more serotonin will have a higher consumption rate. 

Blastomas include types of cancers that originate from abnormalities in precursor cells, called blasts. These cancers are more common in children, perhaps because more cells are growing and dividing in different regions of the body than those of an adult’s. Many blastomas are related to mutations in the p53 tumor suppressor gene, which is involved in the cell cycle. Retinoblastoma is a specific type of cancer included in this category. It is almost exclusively found in young children and develops in the retina. Many treatments involve eye surgery or eye removal, however, this cancer is survivable. A decent amount of information is known about this disease: there is a heritable form and a non-heritable form. Bilateral cases tend to be heritable, while unilateral cases tend to be non-heritable. A common mutation that can lead to the heritable form of retinoblastoma is that of the Rb1 protein on chromosome 13 and can be explained by the two-hit model, where an affected individual must have the deleterious mutation on both alleles inherited from the parents.

Cancer, due to its widespread nature, has many methods of classification and diverse nomenclature. One example of this is the difference between a carcinoma and a sarcoma. Carcinomas are cancers that arise from epithelial cells, while sarcomas arise from cells of mesenchymal origin. This means they arise from connective tissue cells, such as the cartilage, fat, muscle, and vasculature. Blood cells are also included in this category.

One rare form of cancer is leiomyosarcoma. This is a malignant cancer of smooth muscle tissue that accounts for 10-20% of all soft tissue sarcomas. Since this type of tissue can be found nearly anywhere in the body, so can this type of tumor. More commonly, it is found in the small intestine, uterus, and stomach. Leiomyosarcomas are more unpredictable than most cancers and are generally resistant to treatment, such as chemotherapy and radiation. It can also remain dormant and recur for many years. Currently, the best method of treatment is surgery while the tumor is still small.

DNA tests can be a really cool way to learn more about yourself. They can give you insight into your ancestry and DNA. However, there are things to be wary about when taking DNA tests. In my class, Human Genome Analysis, our professor played us this video about the truths of DNA testing and continued on to share his personal stories with DNA testing. In the video, the lady discussed that people will end up contacting you whether you want them to or not. I find this very fascinating because you can find out so many things about ancestors that you didn’t even know existed. However, others may not find this as cool because they might not want to know secrets about their families. DNA testing has gotten so much better over the years and its ability to accurately pinpoint where your family is from is amazing. It used to just tell you your family is from Europe but now it has the ability to tell you where precisely in Europe your family is from and such. Testing my DNA and finding out where I am from is such an exciting experience and I cannot wait to see where my family is from.

Alpha-keratin is a type of protein found in all vertebrates to form a skin. Birds and reptiles have an additional protein called beta-keratin which is the main structure of feathers and beaks for birds, and reptilian skin and claws for reptiles. The primary feathers, known as contour feathers are the most common type of feathers found in birds. It has the long flat shape with a hollow stick called a calamus supporting the root and connecting to the rachis. Lateral barbs then branches off from the rachis creating the soft and smooth shaft of feather. The inner part of the feather serves as insulation, and the outer part is for different purposes. Barbs can be separated into three structure: barbule, barbicel, and ramus. Barbules is the thin flexible part of the feather which gives the texture. Then from that as the feather goes inward toward the body, it becomes more rigid structure to support the shape and give insulation.

This creature is around 1  inch long and is a pale yellow color that is has some reddish brown marking one one end. Its body is divided into roughly 15 segments of differing sizes. The segments on the ends are the smallest and increase with size untill that largest segment in the middle of the body. Each segment has 2 small, brown dots on either side of it. On the side with the reddish brown coloration, there are small pointed legs compared to the rest of the body which has flat and very short "legs". Using the longer pointed legs, this creature uses moves the top half of its body around as if it observing the nearby area and then by contracting its body and using the flats legs it pushes itself forward. The creatuere would generally take a bit of time exploring with the red side and then switch and move around to a different location in the cup. While it did make a couple trips around the cup, The creature always stayed along the cups walls and never ventured into the center. One possibility for this might have bbe nthat the center of the cup was slightly more elevated than the outside resulting in most of the food to be scattered along the walls. At one moment the creature contracted just the last couple of segments of the non reddish end a deposited a small piece of some substance. Based on the behavior of the Reddish end, where its appears to be obsering the enviorment I would assume that The reddish brown end would include the mouth and sensory organs while the other side would be resposible for waste deposition.

• small creature; about 3 cm long
• slow movement with limited motility
• moving around the perimeter of the container
• rod-shaped body with segements
• no legs that are visible
• posterier has 2 dark brown circular spots
• cone shaped head

I observe a small creature, living that is; circuling the perimeter of the container in which it is held captive. The creature is a light brown color in the shape of a rod that is about 3 centimeters long. I can assume that the creature is a larvae and is quite confused being in such an environment. If I shake the larvae into the middle of the container; it slowly makes its way to the edge of the container once more.

The organism appears to be about an inch in length and has small rings circling its body. These rings protrude from its body and seem to help it move. The width of the organism things out towards one end and gradually comes to a small black tip. This tip seems to help the organism sense its surrounding and move around by digging onto the surface and squirming forward. The other end of the organism is a lot thicker and cuts off leaving it looking as if someone cut off a chunk of its body. This section contains two red dots that frame the end. The overall color of the subject is a light tan and it has a translucent layer around it that is shiny. It also has an almost cloudy interior. The underside of the organism almost perfectly resembles the top.

A some form of larvae was provided for observation. The size was longer in length and wider in diameter then other provided larvaes. It had a bilateral structure, with a body shape that the middle part of the body being ider tha the head and tail. It had a shape of an ellipse. The larvae had a segmented body with two red dots on each sides and a light line crossing through the segment horizontally. The color of the body was creamy white, the head was dark red, and the very tp of the head and the tail was black. Counting the head as the first segment, the second, third and fouth segment had a larger red paired feet that kept on moving as it was trying to sense something on the wall. The larvae moved in a wave-like motion with the front part of the body first stretching out then the hind part of the body following it to bring back the length to normal. The back part of the body, the sixth and seventh segment had smaller paired feet compared to the frontal feet, which seemed to only function for walking. The fifth, nineth, and the tenth segmet did not exhibit any feet. There was a long black line that ran through the top of the head to the tip of the tail and on the sixth sehment, there was a black spot on the skin. For the behavior aspect, the larvae did not show curiosity to the food inside of the container. It only showed concern to the wall. It did not walk the middle of the container, but stayed on the outer side of it. The lavae also did not show any distraction when the lid of the container was hit few time to make sound, nor when the container was moved around. It just kept on walking along the side. However, when the container was flipped, the larvae had a shock, in which it stopped moving for few seconds. After time, the larvae started to roll around to adjust its orientation, then started to move in the wave-like motion again.