New Heartland disease spreads in the Midwest


Hey guys and welcome back to my blog post. Today will be current events day! Yay! Mainly what the article is about is the new virus that is affecting the midwest of the USA. It's symptoms are fever and a dangerous drop in the white blood cells. Doctors are testing patients to see if they have that deadly disease. But that's not all, this is not a worldwide epidemic. Scientists are confirming that eight people had this illness. The disease was first noticed back in 2009 when two farmers came to the hospital and reported flu like symptoms. The doctors soon found out that the farmers had the Heartland virus due to the number of tests that they did. Also they found out that the virus is caused by ticks. The doctors then cured another six patients. One of them died, but the rest recovered.

The reason why I chose this article is because I wanted to show you that there is a new disease out there that can cause death. Also, did you know that ticks can spread a wide variety of diseases?


Well see ya later guys.



Link:

Midwest

                                  Cloning

             Hey guys and welcome back to my new blog post. Today we are going to be talking about cloning and how it affects life and why people still debate about this topic. First off I will explain what cloning is, cloning is the process of creating a copy of another organism by copying it's DNA. Cloning can also mean scientists genetically engineering a person duplicating it into a clone in an experiment just like the clone troopers in the pictures below. But all of that is not the same as asexual reproduction in bacteria or cell division  because that's just all reproduction stuff. the upside of cloning a person on the other hand is it can make the person have better eyesight and other physical enhancements.









                     Now I will explain what animals have been cloned. The animals that have been cloned are pigs, which a family of pigs had a member named Millie that have been cloned. The other animals that have been cloned are deer, monkeys, cows, rabbits, and other mammals. But the most well known animal that has been cloned is named Dolly the Sheep.





                    You all might be wondering about exactly what happened to Dolly once she was cloned. Dolly, like all cloned animals was put into a test tube. When she was first cloned she came from an adult cell. Part of the cells came an ewe( female sheep). Later on in her life she developed arthritis and was taken to the doctor to see if she does have arthritis. Then she died in only six years. The cloning process did prove that clones can age prematurely.








                   Cloning can bring some extinct animals back to life because the scientists can find DNA that is located in their bones. But scientists have to find DNA that has not been gone yet. Some animals that have been preserved in museums and animals preserved in ice like the wooly mammoth in the last ice age will be the perfect organisms to test out. Others can't be brought back to life.  

          
                                                                                             I'm back! roar.
  
                        Cloning is a huge conflict today in our society. But the advantages for cloning are like I said, it can make the human race stronger, have more muscle, become more intelligent, and other physical enhancements. Other advantages are that it can make other humans live longer. For example, if someone has a kidney failure, then the doctors can clone that organ and they can transplant that organ and the person will live. Cloning can also allow certain, helpful genes to be passed on one generation after another. The disadvantages are that cloning is inhumane. It can separate reproduction from human relationships. The technology today is not perfected yet so it can cause major problems in the process. The last disadvantage is that like I said, cloning can cause premature aging and can let clones be prone to diseases. In my opinion, they should stop cloning because they have no right to play god.    


Well, see ya later guys




Links:

What is cloning

Animal clones

Dolly

Extinct animals

cloning info

                     Mutations: a Natural Error

                   Hello and welcome back guys, today we are going to be talking about mutations and how it affects organisms. A quick review of what DNA is, DNA is an incredible molecule that stores all of the  genetic information and all of the body's functions. Now, what a gene is, is a basic unit of hereditary material that can be passed on to your children.






              That can be a problem however. Because genetic mutation can occur and it can cause a lot of problems. What genetic mutation is, is a perminent change in the DNA sequence that makes up a gene. the reason why it happens is because there is an error in copying the bases.









            Luckily there is a worker that can fix that problem which is DNA repair. it's role is to repair some of the non-permanent changes to the problem.







           What's worse is that genetic mutations cause health problems. The three examples to what they caus eare disease, such as Huntington's disease , deformed appearance, such as the Elephant Man, and color blindness.


















There are some benefits for mutations as well. Evolution is the key benefit to mutation because it can develop adaptations and other things in your body like intelligence.





                 Also, mutations can occur when you aer exposed to ultraviolet radiation, or an error copying DNA during cell division.

Well, see ya later.




  Links:

Gene picture

Mutation

DNA repair picture

Mutation problems

Elephant Man

                  RNA: DNA's little sidekick

              To the Batmobile Robin! Just kidding, anyway, hey and welcome back to my geniune blog post.:) Today we are going to be talking about RNA and how it can help the body cells. First of all, what RNA( short for Ribonucleic acid) is is a very unique molecule whose roll is to act as the messenger for the organelles of the cell and DNA and controls the protein synthesis.

























RNA can be found anywhere. They can even live inside of viruses and bacteria and can be found inside every single living organisms. Like that insect for example.




Why RNA is extremely important is because it carries genetic information from DNA and transfers it to the ribosomes. The process known as protein synthesis is very vital. Once the RNA transfers the genetic information to the ribosomes, the ribosomes start creating proteins which are vital to our growth.  




Also, a ribosome is an organelle that is made out of RNA. The main function of ribosomes are when the mRNA comes in, the ribosomes translates mRNA to a sequence of amino acids. After that, they finally produce proteins.





There are three types of RNA. messenger RNA, translator RNA, and ribosome RNA. What the messenger RNA does is it leaves the nucleus and gives the ribosome the code or the recipe to make proteins.the tRNA helps translates the codes for the mRNA when they can't understand it. rRNA is just found in the ribosomes and is what the ribosomes are made out of.

Well see ya later.










Links:
Rna picture 

Example of animal

RNA

RNA graph

ribosomes

                    DNA: Everything about you

                    Hello and welcome back to a new blog post. Today we are going to talk more about DNA and how it can help us become unique and live the way we want to live. First off I will explain what DNA is , DNA( short for deoxyribonucleic acid), is hereditary material found all over your body inside of your cells usually in the nucleus. Some are in the mitochondria. The reason why DNA is important is because without it, we wouldn't live since it contains life's functions. Also, it makes us unique.


























Speaking of DNA, there are famous people that were pioneers of the DNA exploration. Rosalind Franklin was a scientist and a biologist that was studying in a college one day building a structure of the tobacco mosaic virus until suddenly, she travelled around the world telling people about her work that led to the model of the DNA molecule. James Watson, and Francis Crick once were gathering background research about x-ray crystallography, until one day, they discovered the molecule which is DNA and started making a humungous model for it.


                                                                    
                                                                                                                                







         Self explanatory to what the picture is above, DNA looks like a twisted ladder with base pairs as the bars of the ladder. The side of the ladder is made of sugar phosphate. The nitrogen bases of the DNA molecule is cytosine, adenine, guanine, and thymine. Adenine is always connected to the hydrogen bond of thymine and guanine is always connected to cytosine.





What happens to DNA as it is being replicated before mitosis is the same thing as the process of mitosis. Although, since the chromosomes are made out of DNA,  they allow the DNA to split into two RNA, and two halves of the chromosome can be split apart during mitosis.


The interesting thing about DNA is, it can be used to investigate crime scenes.How it is used to investigate crime scenes is, the investigators can read the code of the DNA to know who it was.




Well, see ya later.




Links:

DNA picture

What is DNA

Rosalind Franklin

Watson and Crick

Nitrogen bonds

replication of DNA

DNA investigation

     Mitosis: The Key to Growth and Development

                       Hey wassup and welcome back to another geniune science blog post. today I'm going to teach you about what mitosis is and what cell division is. First off, we will talk about what mitosis is as mentioned and how it relates to cell division.LINK


 Mitosis relates to cell division because it's when cells divide and reproduce. Cell division enables living things to grow and help replace injured or dead cells. When one cell divides a new cell is replicated. Mitosis is the same thing as that. Why mitosis is important is because it helps the body grow as you get older.





clump of cells under microscope





cell division






Mitosis is a process in which it contains the following steps:

• Interphase(the beginning): when a cell begins to divide, chromosomes begin to duplicate and daughter chromatids appear.
• Prophase: the nucleus prepares for cell division and the chromosomes start to divide and replicate.
• Metaphase: the two copies of each chromosome line up like a military march and spindles begin to attach to them
• Anaphase: the chromosomes are pulled by the spindle fibers to each end of the cell. The new nuclear membrane forms on both sister chromosomes
• Telophase: two groups of chromosomes are formed and the cells divide into two by allowing the cell membrane to split into two.

What happens in cytokinesis is that the cell membrane and the rest of the cell officially split into two cells.







mitosis



I know that it is a short blog post but really, I hope you liked it and I will see you on another geniune blog post.:)
 

  

      Nothing Sees Color Like the Mantis Shrimp

mantis shrimp's vision


Hello and welcome back to another geniune blog post. Today we are going to be talking about the mantis shrimp's vision and the ridiculous amount of photoreceptors it has.  
Most mammals have two types of photoreceptors which are cells located in your eyes that convert light into electrical signals which allow the brain to see certain colors. Mammals have three photoreceptors, reptiles have four photoreceptors and butterflies have six. But the mantis shrimp has twelve photoreceptors. more suprisingly, the mantis shrimp uses an amazing vision system. Though of course they wouldn't be able to tell the difference between light yellow to dark orange because of how many photoreceptors they have, but they can easily see basic colors. The interesting fact is, unlike humans which have to have the signals go to the brain, the mantis shrimp skips that step of their vision.




 

I personally felt pretty interested in that article. I learned what a photoreceptor is and how it affects an animal's vision. The mantis shrimp's vision is what amazed me the most and I think it's vision is what makes this amazing arthropod move away from predators more easily.

     Viruses: Illnesses You Do Not Want to Get


You guys ever heard of viruses? You guys think that they can get into your body and infect you just like bacteria but they don't. In fact, I'm gonna tell you guys about the information about the virus.


 First of all let me tell you what the virus is, viruses are biological agents that have a protein coat called a capsid. They are also smaller than a microrganism. How they affect the living organisms is that they can get into your skin then they can go deeper  and unlock it's way inside the cell and control the cell's mechanisms. Then the organisms get sick.



virus infecting cell





How viruses multiply is as I said using the cell's mechanisms. But that's not all, First they have to inject the strand of DNA and RNA to the organelles of the cell. Then they use the cell's organelles to replicate themselves.





                                      list of viral illnesses


Now let me explain what active and latent viruses are and how they are different. Active viruses are viruses that exist in an active state and cause disease when they get into your system and latent viruses exist in an inactive state once they get in to your body and don't cause disease, although, they will do years later. LINK


Some viral related illnesses besides the picture that I just posted above are AIDS, ear infections, and tonsillitis.LINK










Now let me explain to you guys who Edward Jenner is, Edward Jenner  is a physician who invented the very first vaccine in 1796 for smallpox, A disease that is still feared back then. Speaking of vaccines, vaccines are a weaked form of a virus that is used to make the immune system learn how to combat the virus kinda like a training session.























Fun Facts:

• The latin word virus means slimy liquid or poison
• Their are a million virus particles in a milliliter per seawater.
• Walter Reed discovered the first virus in 1901
• They are sometimes covered in a fatty coating

see ya guys later.


  

      Bacteria Episode II: Attack of the Antibiotics

 This is the era of the Bacteria Wars and the antibiotics(clone troopers) are losing against the bacteria(battle droids) because of the huge upgrade that mutated them into stronger bacteria(super battle droids) that allowed them to grow and thrive.  Just kidding. Anyway, this time we are gonna get more in depth about bacteria.


From last week, we learned about bacteria and what their characteristics are. Bacteria can be helpful and beneficial because bacteria can allow humans to digest their food properly. They can be ingredients in yogurt, cheese, etc. They can recycle dead organisms and decompose them. They can fix nitrogen which is a nutrient plants need. Believe it or not, some of the bacteria can be in some of the antibiotics. The antibiotics are fed to the animals even when they are not sick. This causes them to have growth hormones.    LINK






                          

Stomach bacteria



How nitrogen fixing bacteria benefits plants and animals is they turn atmospheric nitrogen into ammonia and they are inorganic compounds which the plants can utilize. How they benefit animals is that the nitrogen can go back to the atmosphere and can help with breaking down organisms by bacteria carrying it.

The nitrogen cycle


Pasteurization is partial sterilization of foods at a certain temperature that destroys harmful microorganisms. How it is important is it destroys disease inside of milk primarily and it adds to the longevity(how long it will be until it goes bad) from causing the milk to go bad.LINK


                                          pasteurized milk
                                              

You can't escape bacteria beacause they are everywhere. Some bacteria can be harmful and can cause human disease. For example, the three bacterial infections are tuberculosis, pneumonia, and strep throat. Tuberculosis is caused by mycobacterium tuberculosis and the symptoms are coughing up blood ands loss of appetite. Strep throat is caused by streptococcus bacteria and the symptoms are high fever, sore throat, and fatigue. Pneumonia is caused by hemophilus influenzae and the symptoms are vomiting, shortness of breath, fever, and coughing. LINK






















Women with pneumonia

All of you guys may have heard of the word antibiotics. First of all let me explain what antibiotics are, antibiotics is what doctors developed to cure people that are sick. But over the years
antibiotics became less affective to bacteria, because one, the overuse of antibiotics became less useful and two, bacteria started to mutate and become resistant to antibiotics.







 
See ya guys later and have a merry christmas and a happy new year.




                                                                                                                                                 

                                Bacteria
              
                Hello guys and welcome back to my latest blog post about the microscopic world of bacteria.:)


               Let's start off with what bacteria really is. Bacteria are microorganisms that are prokaryotic( as mentioned in my previous blog posts). The cell structure contains:

• pili- they have hair like structures that can transfer DNA to another bacteria.
• basal body- which can anchor the base of the flagellum and allows it to rotate.
• capsule- a layer in the outside of the cell wall.
• cell wall- a layer membrane outside of the plasma membrane LINK 
• cytoplasm- a jelly like substance that contains ribosomes and genetic material are located
• flagellum- a long whip like structure in which it allows the bacteria to move.
• plasma membrane- a membrane located inside the cell. It generates energy and transports chemicals
• ribosomes- small organelles rich in RNA.

Many bacteria come in all different shapes and sizes. The can be rod shaped, spiral shaped, or sphere shaped. The spiral shaped ones usully look like party streamers. They can move by using their whole body . Rod shaped bacteria look like bars. They move by using their flagellum or cilia. Finally, sphere shaped bacteria look like spheres and they use the same movement as the rod shaped ones.

               bacilli




spirilla



Also fission is when two bacteria reproduce sexually or asexually (as mentioned in my previous posts) and split into more bacteria.








fission






How bacteria obtain food and energy is thet they are heterotrophic, which means that they get food from other organisms. They can trap other organisms. They can make their own food(autotroph) by using photosynthesis. They can even make food and energy using the power of the sun.





You probably might be wondering about why eubacteria and archaebacteria are classified differently. Because they have different chemicals and RNA. Eubacteria can make their own food and they can add oxygen to the atmosphere.they can't live in extreme environments. Archaebacteria can consume or make their own food. They can survive in hostile environments like volcanos, acidic environments and deep ocean vents. Some of them can live inside of you. They can help break down the food in your intestines.





Well, see ya later.

                                                        Ants on Guard

https://student.societyforscience.org/article/ants-guard


                      In the Summer in 2001, John Styrsky went into the rainforest and suddenly, He bumped into something which is an acadia tree and felt stinging sensations. he took off his shirt and found 15 ats swarming all around the shirt and kept on biting him repeatedly. the ants did that to protect there home which is the tree. What it turns out is ants live inside trees and they create a symbiosis of them and the plants. The plantsd can help out the ants in a way. Ants cut down plants that harm their home. As I go on, ants can guard the type pf tree called the tangarana. no plants grow near it so the ants have to guard the tree. they cut off the leaves with their mandibles and ate insects and other animals. they also eat the sugars and fats that the plants produce. So, in conclusion, ants do protect plants.





The story happened in the summer in 2001. it didn't have anything to do with past events or anything. This issue just got posted on the website. this event also occured in the Borneo rainforests in Indonesia.

The story can be important because it can show the people that ants can be territorial. It can also show them that ants can help the plants live. I chose the article because it's interesting and can provide more info about ants. Also as the story develops it can probably show how the ants got the instinct to protect the plants.

So, Why do ants protect the plant?

Because they can create a symbiosis with them and they can help the plant live. Also, they can eat the plant's sugar's and fats that the plant produces by photosynthesis.

                       Protists part II: Algae

                          Hey guys and welcome back on the sequal of the microscopic world of algae.:) We are gonna be talking about how and what they are like.

                       
http://botany.si.edu/references/dinoflag/

                 How plant like protists have the same aspects as plants are, they have chlorophyll as mentioned in the previous blog posts. They rely on photosynthesis which is the conversion of light into their own food called glucose, and they make up some multi celled organisms like kelp. How they are different is that they don't have stems, they don't have roots, and they don't have leaves.

                         





                  Y'all might be wondering about what groups of algae are fit into that group. There are six groups of algae. The most common one is green algae which can rely on photosynthesis. The can also give out half of the world's oxygen. red algae can get some of the sunlight and live deep under water. brown algae can be used as ingredients for chocolate pudding and toothpastes. they can also be depicted as seaweed and kelp. diatoms contain a substance for gold called silica. Euglenoids have a salt water food chain. Finally, dinoflagellates cause the red tide and is the most dangerous type of algae.

Well, some of the important uses algae can do for the environment is green algae can give out half of the world's oxygen as mentioned in the paragraph above.XD. Brown algae can help out the environment too by providing ingredients for pudding and toothpaste.

 

 

well, see ya guys later

                                Protozoa

                   Hey guys and welcome back to my geniune blog on one of the fascinating things in the microscopic world




                   The characteristics that the protists share are that they are mostly animal like organism because of how they move and they eat other organisms too. The animal like protists can't make their own food.  Some of them can be fungus like and can suck the nutrients from other organisms. Finally, the plant like protists like kelp and plankton can reproduce by using the process called photosynthesis

Scientists do classify the protozoa by the movement of the protists. There are four types of protists based on how they move. One is the amoeboid, which moves by changing shape. Second is the ciliate, which moves by their cilia (which are tiny hairs on the sides). Third is the sporozoa, which are parasitic and don't move for most of their lives. Finally, the flagellum, which moves by the flagella(whip that works like the propeller).

Amoeboids use pseudopods to eat. flagellates use their flagella to digest their food. The cilia is the only group of protozoa that have the micronuclei and the macronuclei. Sporozoa are parasitic and they cause harm to the host. they are all parasitic and symbiotes.


The importance of some protozoans are that they can be helpful to humans and other living things. How they can help other organisms is by helping the host digest its food. Others can harm the host by spreading through contact of other organisms like malaria, a disease that can cause death and can be spread by mosquitoes.

Well, some protozoans cause diseases.  Malaria is the most well known one they can cause as I explained above. The symptoms are fever, headache, and vomiting but the symptoms don't start until 4 weeks. More symptoms are coma life long learning disabilities and death.


See ya guys later.



http://www.atlanticpestsolutions.net/mosquitos-ticks/


http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/sciences/botanicalsciences/majordivisions
/kingdomprotista/Protists/protists.htm

http://www2.estrellamountain.edu/faculty/farabee/BIOBK/biobookdiversity_3.html

http://www.malarianomore.org/pages/what-is-malaria?gclid=COnNzp_22roCFUPl7Aod0GIA9Q

                      The Upside of Cheating
                  
                    by: Stephen Ornes 5:22 pm October 2, 2013 




This article is about the people who cheat feel a buzz and the buzz may encourage them to cheat again. How scientists figured it out is the people that cheat usually feel guilt or shame and they get an emotional high after cheating. But that's not all, Scientists recruited 179 volunteers for a test of cheating. Their job is to unscramble as many words as possible in under 4 minutes. After the test they were told to tear off the sheet stapled to the test sheet and keep the test sheet. Each person conducted the test in private and 10 participants cheated on that in a room that the volunteers took in. After that, the scientists asked the 10 participants how they felt, and participants felt a surge through positive emotions such as happy, excited, or proud for example.





I felt pretty interested in that topic. The topic did have some psychological and mental teachings about cheating and what feelings you have when you cheat. Just so you know guys, don't cheat, because it's bad for tests and for life.



See ya guys later.










https://student.societyforscience.org/article/upside-cheating

Why Leaves change color

                    Why Leaves Change color

Hey guys and welcome back to my very own blog :D. Today were gonna be talking about why leaves change color and how they do that.



Well as all of you guys know from my previous blogs change color by the green pigment chlorophyll. It's job is to capture the sun's light rays and moves the sun's molecules to the stomata that creates glucose. Interesting fact is that glucose is found in many different types of fruit. The chlorophyll reflects  green light and absorbs red and blue light.

The reason why trees stop producing chlorophyll is because the weather got cooler and days are getting shorter and their is fewer sunlight. When the leaves in the tree change color the chlorophyll conceals the two pigments carotenoids which produce yellow, orange, and brown colors and anthocyanins which produce red, pink, and purple colors. The foods that have carotenoids are pumpkins and bananas and anthocyanins apples and grapes.






























How these colors change in the fall is the trees respond to the changes of the weather and leaves start to say goodnight to the sun for a few months.





























What happens to the leaves in the winter is they fall off of the tree because of the water within the cells of the stem of the leaf. But evergreen trees don't lose leaves because of the waxy coating and the fluids inside the cells contain a substance that resists freezing.

Well see ya later haters.


http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070801191740AAvu0Yc

http://www.chm.bris.ac.uk/motm/chlorophyll/chlorophyll_h.htm

http://www.123rf.com/photo_7050083_globe-and-green-leaves-with-drop-of-water-eco-concept-illustration.html

http://dnr.wi.gov/eek/veg/trees/treestruecolor.htm