Mendel's Genetics: Keystone of Biotechnology By Phil Krstulich Student no. 100801496 BIOL 1010
Modern advances in biotechnology hinge upon humanity's comprehension of genetics through the rigorous application of good scientific practices. Additionally, observation is limited to the tools of the era; it is with this in mind that Gregor Mendel is worthy of the moniker, 'Father of genetics'. His diligent observations with the tools he did have were all the more impressive, and demonstrate the significance of his contribution to human knowledge. His work on inheritance has an extremely broad and deep impact on biotechnology. Gregor Mendel was best known for his work involving the study of …show more content…
For example, he discovered that only one of four offspring of his pea plants had full recessive traits, two out of four were heterozygous and one would have fully dominant genes. Therefore supposing trait W comprised the dominant trait for wrinkled pea pods, and w was the recessive trait for smooth pea pods, then in the first generation of offspring of breeding between a fully homozygous dominant plant and a fully homozygous recessive plant(assuming there were four new plants), one plant would be ww or smooth pea pods, two would be heterozygous dominant wrinkled pods (Ww) and one would be fully dominant, or WW . Depending on the assortment of genes in subsequent generations, and which plants were bred with which others, it would be possible to get fully recessive smooth pods out of the offspring of the heterozygous dominant wrinkled Ww plants and the homozygous recessive ww plants, but not of the homozygous dominant WW plants. Despite carrying the recessive traits, both heterozygous plants express the wrinkled phenotype as the genes for the smooth pods are the recessive ones. Before genetic testing, the importance of Punnett squares and pedigrees for cultivated plants and animals could not be over-emphasized, especially for accurately gauging the distribution of alleles. Understanding the phenotypic expression …show more content…
The reason humanity is capable of raising larger crops with lower rates of spoilage is due to applying our knowledge of biology to agriculture. While Mendel lacked knowledge of DNA and other aspects of molecular biology, his work was still an important step for humankind's initial foray into the study of breeding and how best to exploit it for the benefit of all. The discovery of genetics by Mendel was absolutely essential to further employment of biotechnology, as without a knowledge of how descendents can receive traits, even if only through being recessive carriers of a desired trait, our own artificial selection of living things would have been much less consistent and in a much more scattershot fashion with many more genetic dead-ends consigned to the waste-basket of history. Today, the methods used by Mendel are quaint and not especially useful for modern applications in biotechnology. However, there are ways in which artificial selection is still used without transgenic organisms; for example, in the first studies on the potential efficacy of phytomining, potential candidate plants for industrial phytomining were chosen based on their natural proclivity to absorb metals, and then were bred to amplify the effect as much as possible; the final step being to use transgenic to further increase metal uptake. Naturally, the purpose of this is to remove harmful or
Modern advances in biotechnology hinge upon humanity's comprehension of genetics through the rigorous application of good scientific practices. Additionally, observation is limited to the tools of the era; it is with this in mind that Gregor Mendel is worthy of the moniker, 'Father of genetics'. His diligent observations with the tools he did have were all the more impressive, and demonstrate the significance of his contribution to human knowledge. His work on inheritance has an extremely broad and deep impact on biotechnology. Gregor Mendel was best known for his work involving the study of …show more content…
For example, he discovered that only one of four offspring of his pea plants had full recessive traits, two out of four were heterozygous and one would have fully dominant genes. Therefore supposing trait W comprised the dominant trait for wrinkled pea pods, and w was the recessive trait for smooth pea pods, then in the first generation of offspring of breeding between a fully homozygous dominant plant and a fully homozygous recessive plant(assuming there were four new plants), one plant would be ww or smooth pea pods, two would be heterozygous dominant wrinkled pods (Ww) and one would be fully dominant, or WW . Depending on the assortment of genes in subsequent generations, and which plants were bred with which others, it would be possible to get fully recessive smooth pods out of the offspring of the heterozygous dominant wrinkled Ww plants and the homozygous recessive ww plants, but not of the homozygous dominant WW plants. Despite carrying the recessive traits, both heterozygous plants express the wrinkled phenotype as the genes for the smooth pods are the recessive ones. Before genetic testing, the importance of Punnett squares and pedigrees for cultivated plants and animals could not be over-emphasized, especially for accurately gauging the distribution of alleles. Understanding the phenotypic expression …show more content…
The reason humanity is capable of raising larger crops with lower rates of spoilage is due to applying our knowledge of biology to agriculture. While Mendel lacked knowledge of DNA and other aspects of molecular biology, his work was still an important step for humankind's initial foray into the study of breeding and how best to exploit it for the benefit of all. The discovery of genetics by Mendel was absolutely essential to further employment of biotechnology, as without a knowledge of how descendents can receive traits, even if only through being recessive carriers of a desired trait, our own artificial selection of living things would have been much less consistent and in a much more scattershot fashion with many more genetic dead-ends consigned to the waste-basket of history. Today, the methods used by Mendel are quaint and not especially useful for modern applications in biotechnology. However, there are ways in which artificial selection is still used without transgenic organisms; for example, in the first studies on the potential efficacy of phytomining, potential candidate plants for industrial phytomining were chosen based on their natural proclivity to absorb metals, and then were bred to amplify the effect as much as possible; the final step being to use transgenic to further increase metal uptake. Naturally, the purpose of this is to remove harmful or