Q&A Hero

Q: Many instances involving genetically modified organisms, especially food crops, will be entering the human food chain in the years to come. On what basis are genetically modified foods considered safe to eat? A) They are only slightly toxic. B) All products to be cleared for human consumption have been personally tested by all members of the regulatory agency. C) Because of the possible economic impact of rigorous testing, such food products are minimally tested in sheep and cattle. D) Each genetically modified food product is screened for its resistance to antibiotics. E) Genetically modified food products are considered safe if they are found not toxic or allergenic or have other negative physiological effects.

Q: Which term is commonly used to describe the production of valuable proteins in genetically modified plants and animals? A) animal farming B) tuna farming C) biopharming D) culturing E) genetic production

Q: Direct-to-consumer provides an accurate assessment of physiological and behavioral circumstances within patients that will eventually replace the need for routine visits to the doctor.

Q: The Genetic Testing Registry is designed to restrict public access to a variety of genetic processes.

Q: Rational drug design involves the synthesis of specific chemical substances that affect specific gene products.

Q: The Human Genome Project seeks to rid the human population of genetic disease.

Q: Biotechnology has yet to produce a single useful product for a human health condition.

Q: Amniocentesis is preferred over chorionic villus sampling because recombinant DNA screening can be achieved with amniocentesis but not with chorionic villus sampling.

Q: A restriction fragment is generated by the action of a restriction enzyme (endonuclease).

Q: Drosophila is a unique candidate for genetic engineering because it is the one prokaryote about which we have a great deal of genetic information.

Q: One of the problems associated with the generation of transgenic plants is that the ecological parameters of many plants are not completely understood.

Q: It is likely that new methods of delivering vaccines will be developed so that traditional injection will be less frequent.

Q: Alleles that differ by as little as a single nucleotide can be distinguished by synthetic probes known as ________.

Q: Genes in their natural state cannot be patented. This policy allows research and use of natural products for the common good. What argument might be presented in favor of patenting genes or gene products?

Q: There is a fear that preconception genetic testing may lead to "designer babies." What historical practice comes to mind regarding the production of such babies?

Q: Can human genes be patented?

Q: In the past decades, direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic tests have become widespread. Are such tests approved by the Food and Drug Administration?

Q: Describe, in general terms, the aims of gene therapy.

Q: How are gene therapy and recombinant DNA technology related?

Q: What term is used to describe the new field engaged to producing more specific, effective and personally customized drugs?

Q: Briefly describe what is meant by gene therapy.

Q: Describe the structure of a DNA microarray and its use.

Q: Prenatal detection of human diseases has been greatly enhanced by two procedures. Name and briefly describe each.

Q: How is a microarray used to scan for mutations in a genome?

Q: Name at least three applications for examining sequence variants such as RFLPs.

Q: Once DNA is separated on a gel, it is often desirable to gain some idea of its informational content. How might this be done?

Q: What is an allele-specific oligonucleotide?

Q: What process is effectively the true test of the functionally synthetic genome?

Q: What method have farmers used for millennia to enhance food production in plants and animals?

Q: A term often used to describe an organism that is a genetic mosaic, resulting from the introduction of DNA from another organism, is ________.

Q: Multigene families are characterized by clusters of tandemly arranged unique pseudogenes organized as operons.

Q: Bacterial genes have introns, and eukaryotic genes lack introns.

Q: There is a general inverse relationship between DNA content and organismic complexity.

Q: Humans have more DNA and more genes than any other organism.

Q: It appears as if about 5000 functional genes is the minimum genome size necessary for life of a prokaryote.

Q: Sequencing the dog genome has indicated that a single locus on chromosome 15 may play a major role in genetically distinguishing large dog breeds from small dog breeds.

Q: Introns are found only in prokaryotic genomes.

Q: Typically, bacterial DNA contains less repetitive DNA than eukaryotic DNA.

Q: The genomic organization of all living creatures is identical.

Q: The terms proteomics and genomics mean essentially the same thing.

Q: In humans, no genes are larger than 2 kb.

Q: The Human Genome Project is an international effort to construct a base sequence of the approximately 3 billion base pairs in the haploid human genome.

Q: Explain the goal of the emerging discipline called systems biology.

Q: In what way will the discipline called metagenomics contribute to human health and welfare?

Q: Archaea (formerly known as archaebacteria) is one of the three major divisions of living organisms; the other two are eubacteria and eukaryotes. Speculate on how an organism such as Nanoarchaeum equitans with one of the smallest genomes known, about 0.5 Mb, can complete its life cycle with so little genetic material?

Q: What is comparative genomics?

Q: Describe the organization of the α-globin gene in humans.

Q: A number of generalizations can be made about the organization of protein-coding genes in bacterial chromosomes. First, the gene density is very high, averaging about ________.

Q: Present a general definition for a multigene family and how it relates to a superfamily.

Q: Briefly describe general trends relating to DNA content and gene number in major groups of organisms.

Q: How are pseudogenes formed?

Q: The dog (Canis familiaris) genome has recently been sequenced. About how many of the dog's genes are shared with humans?

Q: Describe the relationship between introns (size and number) and organismic complexity in eukaryotes.

Q: Present an overview of the gene organization in large-genome plants.

Q: Which two factors contribute significantly to the wide ranges of genome size among eukaryotes?

Q: Intron frequency varies considerably among eukaryotes. Provide a general comparison of intron frequencies in yeast and humans. What about intron size?

Q: What is meant by the term low gene density? Give an example of an organism with low gene density.

Q: One major difference between prokaryotic and eukaryotic genes is that eukaryotic genes can contain internal sequences, called ________, that get removed in the mature message.

Q: What appears to be the range of the number of protein-coding genes per genome in eukaryotes?

Q: What is meant by the term pseudogene?

Q: What is ELSI?

Q: The term paralog is often used in conjunction with discussions of hemoglobin genes. What does this term mean, and how does it apply to hemoglobin genes?

Q: Name the two strategic methods that scientists are using to sequence genomes.

Q: Proteomics is the ________. A) process of defining the complete set of proteins encoded by a genome B) harvesting of proteins from a cell to determine their economic value C) manipulation of amino acid sequences in proteins to alter their function D) changing of the terminal sequences of proteins to alter their function E) rational design of drugs based on protein structure

Q: What is one major limitation of two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-DGE)? A) It is extremely costly to execute in a typical molecular biology laboratory. B) When products are separated, they tend to leach out of the gel matrix. C) Only the most abundant products are detected. D) 2-DGE can be run only on nucleic acids. E) 2-DGE is useful only in separating eukaryotic gene products.

Q: The human genome contains approximately 20,000 protein-coding genes, yet it has the capacity to produce several hundred thousand gene products. What can account for the vast difference in gene number and product number? A) Alternative splicing occurs. B) There are more introns than exons. C) There are more exons than introns. D) Much of the DNA is in the form of trinucleotide repeats, thus allowing multiple start sites for different genes. E) Every gene can be read in both directions, and each gene can have inversions and translocations.

Q: In general, the organization of genes in bacteria is different from that in eukaryotes. In E. coli, approximately 27 percent of all genes are organized into contiguous, functionally related units containing multiple genes under coordinate control that are transcribed as a single unit. Such contiguous gene families are called ________. A) transcriptomes B) proteomes C) contigs D) operons E) pseudogenes

Q: What is the typical gene density per kilobase in prokaryotes? A) 426,000 B) 3000 C) 1200 D) 1 E) 12

Q: A bacterial polygenic transcription unit ________. A) contains information for one protein product B) contains information for more than one protein product C) is capped at the 5'end and carries a poly-A tail at the 3'end D) is void of start (AUG) and termination (UAA, UGA, UAG) triplets E) None of the answers listed is correct.

Q: Most of the bacterial genomes described in the text have fewer than ________. A) 10,000 genes B) 5000 base pairs C) 500 genes D) 10,000 base pairs E) 50 genes

Q: Compared with prokaryotic chromosomes, eukaryotic chromosomes are ________. A) large, mainly organized in single gene transcription units without introns B) small, mainly organized in single gene transcription units with introns C) large, mainly organized in polygenic transcription units without introns D) small, mainly organized in polygenic transcription units without introns E) large, linear, less densely packed with protein-coding genes, mainly organized in single gene units with introns

Q: Compared with eukaryotic chromosomes, bacterial chromosomes are ________. A) large, mainly organized in single gene transcription units without introns B) small, mainly organized in single gene transcription units with introns C) large, mainly organized in polygenic transcription units without introns D) small, with high gene density E) large, triple-helix, Z-DNA, organized in single gene units with introns

Q: Numerous scientists around the world have proposed to sequence 10,000 vertebrate genomes in five years. What is the name of this plan? A) Genome 10K B) Bigger Than Life Plan C) 10K or Bust D) Vertebrate Beginnings E) Vertebrate Enlightenment

Q: The Human Genome Project, which got under way in 1990, is an international effort to ________. A) determine the base sequence of the human genome and to identify all the genes within B) collect samples of cells from all parts of the world in order to preserve human genetic diversity C) collect plant seeds in order to reduce the impact of human activity on plant extinction D) clone deleterious genes from humans and study their mode of action E) clone beneficial genes from humans for eventual use in gene therapy

Q: A knockout animal, in the context of recombinant DNA technology, is one that has been completely anesthetized.

Q: The function of a ddNTP in DNA sequencing is to methylate guanine.

Q: The main purpose of a probe is its insertion in plasmid DNA.

Q: In a PCR, primers are complementary to stretches of DNA with which they anneal.

Q: During a PCR, heat is provided to inactivate the polymerase enzyme.

Q: In a typical PCR, primers are used to cleave specific regions of the DNA template.