GS Activity: Making Babies II (Student Version)

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Making Babies Activity II: Understanding rules of inheritance for several traits, while considering alignment, crossover, sex-linkage and lethal genes.

GenScope File: MakingBabies.gs

Start off by double-clicking on the Making Babies file. This will automatically start up GenScope with two dragons, Wilma & Fred, already showing. OK, now you're going to try to make babies of various kinds but this time you will control which way the chromosomes go.

Remember that to make a baby you have to start with a cell from the mother and a cell from the father (use the cell tool -the one that looks like a little circle -and click on a dragon). Then you run meiosis to make the gametes (the four little cells that carry the baby's chromosomes) and drag one gamete from the mother (on the left) and one from the father (on the right) into the middle window. Then you run fertilization and the two gametes (an egg from the mother and a sperm from the father) come together to make the baby.

1. Make a boy dragon with no horns, wings, and two legs.

Hint: you'll be able to do this much more easily if you can control which way the chromosomes go. Here's how: before you run meiosis, click on one of the magnifying glasses to open up the big window. Up in the corner of the screen you'll see the word "Alignment" and under it "Auto" and "Controlled." Click on the button next to "Controlled." Next time you run meiosis it'll stop in the middle and let you decide where the chromosomes should go, so you'll be able to make the gametes you need. 2. Now try to make a dragon with four legs. Hint: what genes does a dragon need to have four legs?

3. See if you can make a female, firebreathing dragon.

4. Can you make a bronze dragon with horns, no wings, and no legs? No hints on this one. We'll just tell you this: it is possible -and if you can do it you're a very good geneticist. Congratulations!

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