Mendilian Genetics, or, Why I Can't Curl My Tongue

For the past few days in Biology we have been investigating genetic traits. These traits are determined by alleles. You receive one allele from each of your parents. These alleles can carry the genetic code for a dominant or recessive gene. If you receive two dominant alleles or one dominant and one recessive allele, you will express the dominant trait. If you receive two recessive alleles you will express the recessive trait. I tested myself and a variety of my family members for four different traits. These traits were: attached ear lobes, widow's peak, hitchhiker's (bent) thumb, and ability to curl your tongue. My findings are below.

From this chart I was able to create the following three pedigrees:

Pedigree for Attached Earlobes. 

Pedigree for Widow's Peak

Pedigree for Tongue rolling

I was quite surprised that only one member of my family had unattached earlobes, none of my family had widow's peaks, and that neither my cousin, my brother, nor myself was able to roll our tongues while our parents could. I found this odd because unattached earlobes are dominant, widows peaks are dominant, and tongue rollers are dominant. I was unable to create several pedigrees because my grandparents could have been AA and Aa or Aa and Aa. There were several such situations, in which it was impossible to find a result.

A gene that can cure cancer and diabetes?

When you think of a cure for cancer and diabetes, what comes to mind? Probably scientists, hard at work in a lab. But surely not a group of Ecuadorians who are all under three and a half feet tall. According to this article, scientists have discovered a that these people are immune not only to cancer, but also to diabetes. This is because they have a disease known as Laron syndrome, and it may be the key to finding a cure for two very deadly diseases. 


The cause of this syndrome is directly tied to the cell cycle. It turns out that Laron syndrome is caused by a specific mutation of a gene which is a receptor for Human Growth Hormone. This gene is known as IGF-1, and if a person has Laron syndrome they have very little IGF-1. Therefore, the Human Growth Hormone is not accepted by the cells, and the person does not grow. This ties into the ideas of proto-oncogenes and tumor suppressors. Certain parts of the cell, called proto-oncogenes, tell the cell when to go through the cell cycle and split apart. If there are no proto-oncogenes, as with Laron syndrome, the cell will not split. 


This is a remarkable progression in the war against cancer and other deadly diseases. If scientists can find a way to change the ways our genes deal with the Human Growth Hormone to cure cancer without harming us in any other way, it would be truly remarkable. However, I highly doubt this could happen. It is always dangerous to mutate a person's genes, and without proper checks this could create even larger problems than cancer itself. Nevertheless, it seems that the secret to curing cancer could really have been hiding in a small village of Ecuador. 




Sources:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/17/science/17longevity.html?_r=1