1/27 Cloning Plants

There are three different ways a plant can clone.

1. Plants clone themselves.

A strawberry plant grows a stem called a runner and a new plant grows from the runner. That new plant is a clone. Similar cloning happens with grass, potatoes, and onions.

2. People clone plants

Vegetative Propagation is simply done by cutting a plant's stem and planting it into the earth. 

3. Scientists clone plants

Scientists use a method called Tissue Culture Propagation where they take pieces of roots and break them up into root cells and put the cells into a nutrient. (Cell Culture- cells are grown under controlled conditions, outside of their natural environment) 

In Culture, the cells become calluses (mass of unorganized cells drives from plant tissue) They are the cells that cover a plant wound.

Specific plant hormones stimulate the cell division which allows the plants that are identical to the original plant to grow. They divide and form different cells like the roots and stems and eventually form a new plant.

Bananas

There are a number of diseases that affect banana plants. Tissue Culture is used to produce bananas the are free from disease. Some plant nurseries have a banana planting area based on tissue culture. 

1/21 Stem Cells/ "Your Inner Healers" Article

There are two different types of stem cells- adult stem cells and embryonic stem cells

Adult stem cells are stem cells after embryonic development and are found in different tissues throughout the body.
They are assigned to a specific tissue and are designed to maintain it.
Their ability to divide is limited.

Embryonic stem cells are at the blastocyst stage. The stem cells are isolated and divide/replicate.
They are able to become any type of cell in the body.

Scientists grow embryonic stem cells. They use a lot of methods and procedures to create them. They have created "recipes" for differentiation: where the embryonic cell is assigned to a important cell in the body (heart, liver, muscle cell)

If scientists can assign the cells to specific cell types, then the cells can treat for disease.

In the article, scientists have found a way to take a adult cell and make it behave like an Embryonic cell. They use manipulations to trick the cell. This process is called cellular reprogramming.

The closest scientists got to that was somatic cell nuclear transfer/cloning where they put an adult cell's DNA into an egg cell.

Extra Credit: Doggies Genotype

Genetics of the colors of the labs:

(B is black, bb is brown)

(ee is yellow)

Yellow= eebb and eeB_

Brown= E_bb

Black= E_B_

Mother= Yellow

Puppies the mother had:

5/12 brown

7/12 black

Mother must be: Bbee

She is yellow so she has ee, and she had black puppies so she must have one B and she had brown puppies so she must have one b.

Father must be: EEbb

If he had Ee or ee, then one of their puppies would have been yellow. Because the puppies are brown and black he must be EE. 

In order to have a brown puppy, he would need a bb. He has a bb because the mother could give a big B and have a puppy that is black. Big B is dominant over little b.