BIOL1003 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Chemotype, Molecular Genetics, Chemical Ecology
BIOL1003: Module 2 - Genetics
Lecture 1 – Module Overview and Introduction to Molecular Genetics
Outline
• Units of inheritance
o Genes and chromosomes
• Reproduction
o Mitosis and meiosis
o Sex determination
• The particulate mechanism of inheritance
o Segregation and independent assortment
o Dominance and sex linkage
• Alleles in populations
o Probabilities and population genetics
o The genetics of evolution
o The consequences of genetics
Molecular Genetics
• Amino acids and forming proteins
• People who can decipher the shape of proteins from the DNA sequences (the creation of
amino acids and then proteins)
• Molecular genetics of chemicals that influence ecological interactions (chemical ecology) -
Andres studies
• Ecological differences - molecular differences in amino acid/proteins - gene sequence
• Punk trees
o Major invasive weed in Florida - on Australian in the east coast too
o Biocontrol is based on understanding chemo types
• Australian tea-tree
o Six chemo-types, only one is commercially useful
o Understanding genetics enables selective breeding
• Good chemo-type is not the best yielding
• Some minor compounds are irritants: can we lose them?
o They test different traits
• This can then allow for selective breeding (after several generational crosses, can
get high yield of good oil from initially trees that produced a high amount of bad
oil, and a tree of a small amount of good oil)
• Lengthy process
• Study of inheritance
o Heritability of traits in one of the major premises of natural selection
o Very little is known about the nature of inheritance in to 20th century:
• Conception by spirit entering women
• Entire homunculus present in sperm
• Averaging of parental traits in offspring
• Uses of genetics
o Disease diagnosis and cure
o Crop and stock improvement
o Forensics
o Conservation
• The genetic variability of a population is important
o Systematics
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