yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

Genetics 101 | National Geographic


2m read
·Nov 11, 2024

  • [Narrator] Genetics helps us understand the biological programming behind all life forms. But what exactly is the science of genetics? And what does its future hold?

Genetics is the study of heredity. The expression of traits and how they are passed from generation to generation. For thousands of years, humans have observed this inheritance of traits and implemented their knowledge to breed and domesticate plants and animals.

However, the science behind inheritance was only starting to be understood in the mid-19th century. Around 1865, Austrian monk and botanist, Gregor Mendel, published the results of his hybridization studies of pea plants. In his findings, he noted the role of factors that influence the expression of traits. These factors later became known as genes.

Each human has between 20,000 and 25,000 genes. This collection called a genome determines a person's traits by influencing factors on a cellular level. Genetic information is stored in every cell's nucleus. Structures called chromosomes carry this information in the form of deoxyribonucleic acid or DNA.

DNA is a double helix of nucleotides, chemical compounds composed of sugar and phosphate molecules along with the bases thymine, adenine, guanine, and cytosine. These segments of DNA are what we call genes, and it is within those genes that chemical compounds provide the coding for all information about a person's inherited traits.

Human cells contain so much DNA to carry this large amount of information that if unraveled, the DNA in each cell would be over six feet long. At the turn of the 21st century, an international effort to decode human DNA was launched called the human genome project; it ended up identifying about 99% of the entire human genetic sequence.

Discoveries in genetics research have unearthed tremendous opportunities in medicine such as genetic testing and the manipulation of genes. But with these opportunities come risks and ethical questions, and finding the answers to those questions may be the next stage of our understanding of genetics.

More Articles

View All
The Mystery of Queen Nefertiti | Lost Treasures of Egypt
[music playing] NARRATOR: Nestling on the east bank of the Nile, Nefertiti’s capital city covered over 3,000 acres, and was home to up to 50,000 people. What is now barren landscape was once one of the greatest cities in the ancient world. And from these…
We're in DEFLATION for the first time in 22 years.
Well everybody, we are in deflation. This is the first time that Australia has been in deflation in literally 23 years. So check this out, this article reads consumer prices in Australia dropped by 0.3 percent year on year in Q2 2020. This was the first d…
How covid impacted private aviation! Parts-1
What do you think Covet did for the private aviation industry? Because I’ll be honest, when that whole thing was going on, that was kind of my first introduction to starting the charter travel. It got very crazy, and even though prices were quite crazy at…
5 BIG Investing Mistakes to Avoid | Stock Market Red Flags
Hey guys! Welcome back to the channel. In this video, we are going to be talking about five really major red flags that you should always be watching out for and avoid companies that show any of these signs. You do not want to invest in any companies that…
Warren Buffett: 5 Life Changing Lessons School Never Taught You
But pick out the person you admire the most, the person that you’d change places with if you could, and then write down why you admire them. Just put it on a piece of paper. And then figure out the person that you would least like to change places with, w…
Welcome to Intro to Computer Science! | Intro to CS - Python | Khan Academy
Welcome to KH Academy’s intro to computer science course in Python! Let’s learn more about what this course has to offer. In this course, you’ll learn the fundamentals of programming, from variables to conditionals, loops, functions, and data structures.…