Prompt 3: "Can't live with it, can't live without it"

Beginning on page 49, Dr. Moalem discusses the importance of the sun to Earth's living organisms. He describes our relationship with the sun as a "can't live with you, can't live without you" sort of situation. This relationship with the sun is represented by Big Idea 2: Biological systems utilize free energy and molecular building blocks to grow, reproduce, and maintain dynamic homeostasis, because it demonstrates how organisms gain energy and resources from their environments to function and maintain internal conditions suitable for life.

 

Explain why living organisms "can't live with" the sun at times and "can't live without" it at other times. Discuss multiple factors…Hint, think about a process we have studied this year. Also include vitamin D, cholestrol, and folic acid as a part of your response and discuss the role/importance of each, and the connections between these terms.

 

Explain the adaptation of skin color. Include in your response, melanin, melanocytes, and ApoE4.

 

Do living organisms also have a "can't live with, can't live without" relationship with ApoE4? Provide evidence for your stance by conducting research on the role of ApoE4. Relate to vitamin D and cholesterol. This is a good website to get some ideas going!! http://www.life-enhancement.com/magazine/article/2695-apoe-epsilon-4-risk-factor-for-alzheimers-disease-why-is-it-still-in-the-gene-pool

 

(Michelle Liang, mliang4@students.d125.org)

 

Prompt 3: Expand on the Whys - Big Idea 1

On pages 205-206, Dr. Moalem sums up his book with the toddler analogy. After completing the book, our understanding of the impact of diseases on our evolution should have become more nuanced and complete. Dr. Moalem addressed hemochromatosis, malaria, Type 1 diabetes, the common cold, as well as others. But like all books, Dr. Moalem cannot address every single disease that exists and the impact that it had upon our evolution, our Big Idea 1. That would become an infinitely long book. But what can be done is to take the knowledge that was given and use it to expand what we know.

Look up a disease of your own choosing. Find if the disease may have offered a selective advantage in certain regions. What ethnic groups are most affected by your disease? In a well-developed paragraph (or paragraphs), delineate your findings.

(Gabriel Antoniak gantoni4@students.d125.org)

Prompt 3: Tolerance and Big Idea 3

On page 178, Moalem explains physiological tolerance. Physiological tolerance is a form of gene expression in that the presence of a drug, medicinal or otherwise, will cause the promotion or suppression of the specific genes that help process the drug. This relates to Big idea 3: Living systems store, retrieve, transmit, and respond to information essential to life processes. When your body receives a substance like alcohol, it will promote the production of the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase to help break down the alcohol. Drinking a lot will keep the production of that enzyme high, but when you stop drinking, your body will slow down production. Tolerance can be problematic, as when a patient is taking a prescribed medication, but the effects are no longer potent enough to be useful, or if a drug user is become tolerant and must take more of a drug to get the same feeling, which can lead to overdose. 

Explain the relation between tolerance and metabolism, like in the example of high alcohol dehydrogenase levels leading to faster transformation of ethanol to acetaldehyde. Also, how is tolerance related to dependency?

What happens to your body when you become tolerant to alcohol, cocaine, or oxycodone? Why do drugs such as LSD and marijuana not cause tolerance?

(Posted by Tina Tian, ttian4@students.d125.org)

prompt 3

On pages 85-87 Moalem talks about how the defense mechanisms of crops can also be poisonous to humans. This relates to big idea #4 (biological systems interact, and these systems and their interactions posses complex properties), because while a certain toxin can defend a plant from attack it can also make it inedible.
In the greater view of ecology is it possible to protect crops without making them toxic to humans in some way? Research if this method would be viable  in the real world and what effects it would have on the environment.
(Tom Shaw tshaw4@d125.students.org)

Prompt 3

On page 119, Maolem begins to discuss how microbes move around from host to host, and how some microbes such as the cold virus need their host to be relatively healthy in order to survive and continue to spread to new hosts, while others such as malaria can attack with no limits at its host. This is a technique used by the microbe to ensure that it has the best chance of spreading. Expanding on the microbes that do not care for the host's condition, Maolem states that evolution favors parasites who can exploit the host to the fullest. This relates to Big Idea 4 as the microbes are interacting with the host.

Research another virus, and state to what extent the virus attacks the host. Also, how can the virus be contained? In the text Maolem also states that outbreaks such as Cholera 1991 in South America can be contained with simple procedures such as water safety, or malaria with mosquito nets. While this definitely sounds possible, given the current state of some areas, is it viable/possible to truly contain these outbreaks if and when they happen?

(Name- Ray Lee, Email- rclee4@students.d125.org )

Prompt 3

On page 102-103, Moalem talks about the actions of a tiny worm called dicrocoelium dentriticum that lives inside sheep and cattle. Moalem shows the worm's cycle of life from egg to offspring and how they return to a different host if their first host dies. The worm's offsprings will travel through the feces, snails, and ants. Finally to return by making the ant commit suicide. This relates to Big Idea 4: Biological systems interact, and these systems and their interactions possess complex properties.
With the dicrocoelium dentriticum in mind determine why living inside of a sheep or cattle provides the worm with selective advantages. Keep in mind the rules of survival we learned such as living space. Next determine how the worm has the ability to take over the ant's nervous system causing the ant to act uncharacteristically. Does the worm require certain proteins in order to control the ant or is there another mechanism?Also research what selective advantages could a parasite gain from infecting a specific host; for example, what selective advantages are there for dicrocoelium dentriticum to infect the cattle or sheep as opposed to a human. Use these results to come up with a solution to reduce the number of parasitic infections or why these infections benefit the ecosystem in the long run. 
Jimmy Wang jimmypelewang@gmail.com

Chris Yao's Ultmate Prompt 3 - Infectious Diseases

On pages 118-120, Dr. Maolem describes how Paul Ewald, a leading evolutionary biologist specializing in infectious diseases, believes that the main factor of an infectious diseases virulence is the method the pathogen moves from host to host. One way microbes move from host to host is through close proximity allowing transmission through the air or close contact. Ewald describes how diseases using this particular mode of transportation are not particular virulent because it is a selective advantage leaving the host capable of moving and thus allowing them to move close to other potential hosts so the infectious agents can survive and reproduce. Another way microbes are transmitted is by using an intermediate organism to carry them to hosts, these organisms include mosquitoes, flies, fleas, and other similar organisms. Since these microbes don't need their actual host to spread, they are more virulent then the first type of disease. It is a selective advantage for diseases in this category to create as many infectious agents as possible as the more microbes there are in our blood, the higher the chance for an intermediate organism, like a mosquito, to pick up and further spread the disease, allowing it to survive and reproduce. The third type of transmission Ewald discusses is transmission through food or water. This case is exactly like the second type and differs only in the fact that the diseases of this category are spread through food and water rather than an intermediate organism. This relates to Big Idea 4: Biological systems interact, and these systems and their interactions possess complex properties.

Choose a different infectious disease to research and explain how it has evolved to produce symptoms that increase its ability to survive and reproduce. Be sure to include how your disease spreads in your response. Additionally, research what is currently being done to treat patients with your disease and describe how these treatments combat the disease and its spread. Finally, since the use of antibiotics can cause the disease to evolve to become resistant, discuss whether or not they should still be used, if not, provide and support an alternative solution.

Chris Yao chyao4@students.d125.org

Prompt 3: Rana Sylvatica and Big Idea 3

On pages 40 - 44, Dr. Moalem discusses the wood frog, Rana sylvatica's response to the extreme cold in the winter. In the spring time you can year the mating call of the frog, but in the winter you don't hear it at all. The frog does not hibernate, instead it buries itself under an inch or two of twigs and leaves and freezes solid.

When the temperature rises again in the spring, it thaws the frog, the heartbeat of the frog sparks, it gulps for air, color returns to its eyes, and it stretches its legs and soon returns to the woodlands to find a mate. It's like the frog returned from the dead.

Here's how it works. A few minuets after the frog senses that the temperature is dropping, it moves water out of its blood and organ cells, and pools the water in its abdomen. At the same time, the frog's liver releases large amounts of glucose into its bloodstream. This significantly lowers the freezing point of whatever water remains in the bloodstream and turns it into a kind of sugary antifreeze. The frog in effect put's its organs on ice. This relates to Big Idea 3: Living systems store, receive, transmit, and respond to information essential to life processes.

Keeping in mind how the frog freezes itself, and Big Idea 3, do you think that some day people will be able to cryopreserve themselves? Why or why not? Do you think that someday scientists will be able to mimic this process in the lab to preserve organs for transplant? Why?

(Posted by Sriya Potham, spotham4@students.d125.org)

Prompt 3: Methylation of DNA, Big Idea 4

In the second to last chapter, "Methyl Madness: Road to the Final Phenotype", Dr. Moalem focuses on the role of DNA methylation and gene expression.  The study of environment influences our genes is called epigenetics, which relates to Big Idea 4 (Biological systems interact, and these systems and their interactions possess complex properties).  Moalem provides many specific examples of how DNA methylation in a mother affects her fetus.  Some choices, like a mother's poor choices in her diet during the pregnancy, make her child prone to obesity later in life by giving them the "thrifty phenotype" (Moalem 163).

In other studies with mice, researchers successfully turned off the agouti gene that created a fat yellow phenotype.  They forced two mice with the agouti gene on to have offspring that were thin and brown by feeding the mothers vitamin B12, folic acid, betaine, and choline; compounds found in prenatal vitamins (Moalem 158).  Later, Dr. Moalem also describes some drugs that affect methylation and therefore affect how a gene is expressed, like in the case of azacitidine, an inhibitor of methylation (Moalem 175).

First of all, how and where does DNA methylation occur?  Are the ingredients from prenatal vitamins such as vitamin B12, folic acid, betaine, and choline methyl donors or do they inhibit methylation?  Find another compound that is a methyl donor.  Is it commonly found in a normal person's diet?  Is more methylation a good thing? Why or why not?


Katelyn Noronha, knoronh4@students.d125.org

Prevalence of cancer in certain parts of the world

Moalem describes on page 67 how vitamin D, which we get from sunlight, has shown evidence of inhibiting the growth of cancerous cells. This implies that increased exposure to sunlight can possibly reduce the risk of cancer. In fact, there is recent evidence that shows that vitamin D can help reduce the risk for breast cancer.

This relates to Big Idea 4, that biological systems interact, and these systems have complex properties. If it is true that vitamin D reduces the risk for cancer, then areas where sunlight is more prevalent should have less people affected by cancer.

Research the prevalence of cancer in certain parts of the world and explain if your findings support or goes against the idea that vitamin D lowers the risk of cancer. If your finding goes against this idea, research other factors that explains why certain parts of the world are more susceptible to cancer than others.

(Aaron Chai, achai@students.d125.org)