Bellarmine Ecosystem

Here is the Bell Ecosystem:


A producer
Plant the creates seeds
The habitat of this plant is simple. It creates by itself at the corner of Carney, surrounded by smaller, by smaller plants with the same job. This plants seems to flourish the most of all the plants in it's personal habitat.

A primary consumer

Chicken

The chickens live on our free ranged garden, eating various vegetation and flourishing in all of their functions.

Secondary Consumer and Tertiary Consumer

Human

The people roam around Bellarmine, eating whatever they want.

Decomposer

Fly

The flies fly around the entire campus, feeding on everything and dominating the campus. They mostly eat feces, food from the cafeteria, and corpses.

Herbivore

Honey Bee

They live in a bee habitat that is located in the garden. 

Carnivore

Fly

The flies fly around the entire campus, feeding on everything and dominating the campus. They mostly eat feces, food from the cafeteria, and corpses.

Omnivore

Human

The people roam around Bellarmine, eating whatever they want.

Threatened Species

Honey Bees

They live in a bee habitat that is located in the garden. 

Endangered Species

Chicken

The chickens live on our free ranged garden, eating various vegetation and flourishing in all of their functions.

Non-native species

Humans

Although humans only migrated to BCP in the 1800s, humans now roam around Bellarmine, eating whatever they want.

Pollution Source

Car

All of the cars are located in the various parking lots. They pollute the whole environment.

Discussion Questions:

1.  Environmental science is the over arching study of life sciences on Earth and their environments while ecology is the individual study of organism's interactions with one another in their specific environments. For example, environmental science at BCP is studying everything, including ecology, the meteorology, the seismology, and the geology. Meanwhile, ecology is simply what we studied today.

2.  The garden is a population that thrives using many biotic and abiotic factors. It has plants that use many abiotic factors including the sun, the carbon dioxide in the air, and the soil. Additionally, the chickens eat those plants, thus utilizing the biotic factors that are surrounding them. Then, the chickens poop out what they ate and the plant uses it.

3. 

4. The most endangered species on campus are the chickens in the garden. Because there is only a couple of chicken. It is scary because if only one or two die, there are none left to reproduce. Additionally, the bees are threatened because the do not have much flowers surrounding them. Once this source of life is gone, they will die off.

5. Pollution is the addition of unnatural masses to an environment. Cars, of course, add gases to Bellarmine with all of the emissions. That is the main pollution source on campus.

Temperature Affecting Respiration Rate In Goldfish

The point of this lab was to analyze the relationship that respiration has to temperature of the environment.

Originally, since I had relatively no back information on this topic, my hypothesis was that the amount of breaths would go up when the temperature went down and the number of breaths would go up when the temperature went up.

It was a fairly simple lab. First, we put the fish into a container that was filled with was that was room temperature. We used Logger Pro to measure the temperature of the water. We counted the amount of breaths that our fish took while at room temperature. Then, we added ice cubes to the water. When the water was at 10-14 degrees Celsius, we counted the amount of breaths that the fish took. We repeated the same thing when the water was 5-10 degrees Celsius. Finally, we recorded our data and made conclusions.

Below I have included my data:

Table reflecting the effects that temperature has to respiration rate.

Graph describing the effects that temperature has on respiration ratr

My personal hypothesis was wrong. It turns out that when the temperature goes down the respiration rate goes down too. When the temperature goes up, the respiration rate goes up. This did not surprise me because when I thought about it, I do the exact same thing.


Analysis Questions:

1. Describe how the fish's respiration rate is affected by temperature. Be detailed.

As the temperature goes up, the respiration rate goes up. As the temperature goes down, the respiration goes down. Specifically, in our experiment this can be shown when our fish breathed 104 times in a minute at room temperature. Although, our fish breathed 53 times in a minute when the water was ten degrees colder.


2. What other factors may have affected the breathing rate?

Some other factors that may have affected the breathing rate are the amount of oxygen in the water, how much the water was moving, the density of the water, and the water pressure.


3. How did your fish compare to the average?

My fish was extremely close to the average, almost the exact same.


4. Why do scientists often take lots of data and look at the average? Why do you think you did that in this experiment?

Scientists take tons of data so that they can understand what the outliers are and make an accurate conclusion. By taking an average, you are seeing what all of the data looks like in a couple numbers that answer the question. We did that in this experiment for that reason.


5. Design an experiment that will test how a fish's respiration rate is affected by light. Explain your design below.

I would put the fish in an environment where there is a constant light. Then, I would use objects that lessen the amount of light, like a paper towel or paper, and use them to cove the fish. I would then count the amount of breaths and analyze.


6. Was your prediction at the beginning of the lab correct or incorrect?

My prediction was incorrect.


7. Propose an explanation for your experimental results. Why do you think fish react this way as their environmental temperature changes?

I think that it happened this way because oxygen is harder to obtain in the environment when the temperature gets hotter, making the fish breath more. I think that when it gets colder, oxygen gets easier to obtain for the fish, and it is able to breath less since it can get it easier.

A Protein Composed of Carbs

I had number 25.

DNA Sequence:

3' to 5'

mRNA Sequence:

created 5' to 3'

AUG*GCU*AUG*AAU*UCU*UAG*CAU*AUU*UUU*UAG*CAU*GAU*UCU*UAG*CGU* UAG*GAA*GAU*AUG*AUG*GCU*UAG*UGU*CAU*AUU*UUU*UAG

Codon Dictionary Used:

Key:

Met or Start = Green

Alanine = Purple

Serine = Green with dots

STOP (Space) = White

Histidine = Orange

Isoleucine = Red

Proline = Yellow/Blue

Glutamic Acid = Pink

Cystein = Brown

          It was super cool to learn about science were you are not just taking notes, but applying it to something that you might eat! Transcription was the frustrating, time consuming part where you are taking lots of time and effort to ensure that every single letter is correct. If it is not correct, you likely have a mutation and have screwed up. Translation is a lot cooler, where you actually see the significance and the message behind all of the codes and letters. I now understand the process and the way it is viewed to a greater extent. I now feel like I know it well enough where I can teach it to somebody. 

Thanks Mr. Wong, 

Joe Sandoval

DNA Extraction Lab

What did we do?
First, we filled a beaker with 5 ml of liquid dish washing detergent, 0.75 of salt, and 45 ml of distilled water. Next, we rinsed the strawberry, put it in a plastic baggie and mashed it a ton. Then, we ran the contents through a filter to remove the big chunks. The liquid content dripped into a test tube. We then added an equal volume of ice cold alcohol to the test tube and began to slowly twirl the tube. A murky thick bubbly substance rose to the top of the solution in the test tube. This thick bubbly substance was the DNA.

Why did we do what we did?
The original crushing of the strawberry was essential because it increased the surface area and began to break down the membranes that are protecting the DNA.
The extraction buffer served the role of further breaking apart the phospholipid membranes. Also, because of the negative charge of the DNA, the salt was able to go in and break down the super phosphate groups, and separate the DNA. Also, this makes it less soluble in water. Making it so that it does not want to be with the rest of the water.
I am not sure why the alcohol was added, but my hypothesis is that it contributed by somehow combining with the DNA and is less dense than water, therefore making it float.

I want to continue to research this to learn how exactly this works. Anyway, it was super cool that we were able to separate the DNA from a fruit that I an familiar with, and I look forward to learning more about the processes of DNA.

Mitosis Lab

Here is the link to my worksheet. It has my image of each stage as well as the table. I will answer the questions on this blog:

Mitosis Lab Handout

1. It is more accurate to call mitosis "nuclear replication" because all of the steps involve the duplication of the DNA and does not really involve the splitting of any other organelles.

2.  These were selected for study because it is super easy to see the chromosomes in their cells and see what they are doing.

1. If I wasn't only looking at the top, there would be a lot more in interphase because that is where they are not really doing anything and are not trying to split. In the rest, they are not going to split, so it will be all interphase.

2. I can infer that each phase takes less and less time as it gets closer and closer to actually duplicating the DNA.

What Is Cancer?

1. How is a cancer cell different than a normal cell?
2. How has cancer treatment evolved as scientists have learned more about cancer?
3. What steps can an individual take to prevent cancer?
4. Why has it been so difficult to find a cure for cancer?
5. What does Richard Klausner mean when he says cancer is like evolution in a bottle?

1. A cancer cell is different from a normal cell because of it's ability to be constantly transforming and mutating to become more and more immune to the drugs that you are trying to use to treat it. It mutates much more than a normal cell.

2. Cancer treatment has evolved as they learn more because as we begin to figure out how a cancer cell tends to mutate, we have learned how to better plan ahead and know the cells next move so that we can find it's weaknesses and ultimately kill it.

3. There are obvious things that an individual can do to prevent cancer: don't smoke, drink in moderation, wear sunscreen, don't be exposed to radiation. But ultimately there is nothing that anybody can do to be completely immune to cancer because we don't know what causes 40% of cases of cancer.

4. It has been so difficult to find a treatment for cancer because the cell is constantly mutating and evolving. It is nearly impossible to treat something that is always rejecting what you are trying to use.

5. When he says that a cancer cell is like evolution in a bottle he means that there have been so many evolution in the world that have made it into what it is. Imagine all of those evolution in one compact space all happening at the same time. Now imagine that for eternity. That is what a cancer cell is like. That's what he is trying to say.

I am happy that we covered such a pressing topic in today's world and I look forward to learning more about cancer in the future.

Cytoplasmic Streaming

First off, here is a link to a video that shows the chloroplasts moving inside of the elodea leaf cells.

Cytoplasmic Streaming

Additionally, here is a micrograph from when we looked at the elodea leaf cells on Tuesday.

What components of the cell theory were visible in the leaf?

          The part of the cell theory that you can really see in the video and the micrograph is that, as it states on page 156 of BSCS Biology: A Molecular Approach Ninth Edition, "Cells or products made by the cells, are the units of structure and function in organisms."
          When I first looked into our microscope and saw these images, I could not help but be astounded by how each cell fits together perfectly, creating the stability and structure that most plants have. It was super easy to see this due to the visible cell walls that set themselves apart by being extremely obvious to see.
          Something else that really stands out to me when I look at an image of these cells is how easy it is to hypothesize that the cells are filled with liquid (cytosol). I can tell that there is liquid inside of the cell because it is super easy for the chloroplasts to move and transport themselves from one spot to another.
          Finally, the last big thing that is easy to tell by looking at these images is that there is a central vacuole. We can tell that there is one in each of the cells because it is easy to notice that there are no chloroplasts in the middle of the cell. Instead they are pushed to the edges and are restricted to only moving near the cell wall.
          In conclusion, we can really learn a lot about cells by simply looking at them with a microscope and I look forward to being able to look further into cells.