Unit 6 Reflection

In this unit we learned about bio technology, which is the manipulation of living things or their parts to benefit mankind. This field of study include 4 main domains:

• Industrial & environmental
• This domain focuses on the production of materials from living things.
• Ex: fermentation of foods and beverages, biodegradable plastics, bio fuels 
• Medical & pharmaceutical 
• This domain focuses on medicines and vaccines from living things
• Ex: medicines and vaccines from plants and fungi, gene therapy
• Agricultural
• This domain focuses on the breeding of plant and animal for human consumption
• Ex: trans-genetic organisms, GMOs
• Diagnostic research  
• This domain focuses on the understanding of our genetics, and using for comparison
• Ex: DNA identification

One of the aspects of Biotechnology that we talked about was bioethics, which about how to decide whether or not to use a technology. This was a very interesting unit, because it brought up the future of where bio tech could take us. There may be a point where we can genetically engineer our children, and eliminate all genetic disorders. We would then have to decide whether or not to allow children to be engineered, and that is a very tough question. 

Some of the technologies we learned about were recombination DNA, which is the process of modifying a plasmid, gel electrophoresis, which allows you to sort DNA by length, and PCR, which creates tons of copies of a DNA segment.

My main strengths were electrophoresis and rDNA, I was less solid on PCR and the domains of biotech but my studying help me a lot. 

We did a lab where we isolated different dyes in different candies and compared them to samples using gel electrophoresis. More information here.

We also modified a bacteria to make it glow green in our pGLO lab

I learned a lot from these labs. They taught me what biotech was like in the real world insted of a sheltered classroom setting.

I still want to learn more about the future of biotech, and how far we are from the world of being able to engineer our children.

My New Years Goals were to get better grades by studying more. I have started that by beginning my studying process, but I still need to tailor my studying to what works for me.