Explain why Drosophila and E. coli
are the most commonly studied organisms in genetics.
State and apply Mendel's principles of dominance,
segregation and independent assortment.
Define and utilize the following terms in
the context of working genetics problems: dominant, recessive, incomplete
dominance, codominance, homozygous, heterozygous, hemizygous, multiple
alleles, sex-linked, epistasis, penetrance, monohybrid, dihybrid, gamete,
genotype, phenotype, test cross, lethal gene, pleiotropy.
State the connection between chromosomal behavior
in meiosis and the inheritance of Mendelian traits, as well as describe
the experiment by McClintock and Creighton that confirmed this association.
State the stage in meiosis where crossing
over occurs, and correctly identify the following terms: chiasmata, synaptonemial
complex, prophase, metaphase, anaphase, telophase, cytokinesis.
Be able to apply the following rules of probability
in the context of genetics problems: sum rule, product rule, degrees of
freedom and chi square analysis.
Analyze genetics problems involving one or
two traits, sex-linked traits, multiple alleles.
Analyze pedigrees to determine mode of inheritance
and predict probabilities of offspring inheriting traits under consideration.
Identify the mode of inheritance of sex in
humans, Drosophila and birds.
Identify linked mutations in coupling and
repulsion.
Map bacterial chromosome using results of
Hfr crosses.
Map linked genes using data from two and three
factor crosses.
Differentiate among the three types of genetic
exchange between bacteria.
Describe the lytic and lysogenic cycles of
bacteriophages.
Define: deletion, tandem duplication, reverse
duplication, paracentric inversion, pericentric inversion and translocation.
Identify chromosomal aberrations using these terms.
Define: aneuploidy and polyploidy.
Analyze human karyotypes to determine sex
as well as gross chromosomal aberrations.
Explain the differences between plants and
animals in terms of their ability to tolerate changes in chromosomal numbers,
as well as the typical outcome of such changes.
Utilize the following terms in describing
the structure of DNA: double helix, base pairing, sugar-phosphate backbone,
Chargaff's rule, 5' phosphate, 3' hydroxyl, antiparallel, pyrimidines,
purines, semiconservative replication.
Compare and contrast DNA replication, transcription
and translation, including the major enzymes involved, as well as location
of events in prokaryotes and eukaryotes.
Describe three types of RNA processing in
eukaryotes.
Describe the genetic code, correctly using
the terms: triplet, degenerate, nonoverlapping, comma free, universal,
unambiguous, ordered, wobble hypothesis, colinearity.
Describe the use of the following tools/techniques
in recombinant DNA technology: restriction enzymes, cloning, Southern,
Northern and Western blots, PCR, synthesizing DNA.
Map the restriction fragments in a circular
plasmid.
Discuss applications of recombinant DNA technology
in medicine, agriculture and industry.
Describe the regulation of gene expression
in prokaryotes and phages, including the following terms: operon, repressor,
inducible, repressible, attenuation.
Describe the regulation of the lac
and trp operons.
Identify the role of the following in gene
expression: sigma factors, enhancers, silencer elements.
Define transposable element and describe the
structure of an insertion sequence.
Identify the significance of transposons in
terms of gene expression, map distances between genes, and antibiotic resistance
in bacteria.
Compare the packaging of DNA in prokaryotes
and eukaryotes, including the structure of the nucleosome.
Describe the structure of centromeres and
telomeres, and explain how telomeric DNA is replicated.
Compare and contrast the function of methylation
in prokaryotes and eukaryotes.
Describe the arrangement of immunoglobulin
genes and explain how numerous antibodies are made from a relatively small
region of DNA.
Identify various types of mutations (silent,
missense, nonsense, frameshift, transitions and transversions).
Distinguish among back mutation, intergenic
suppression and intragenic suppression.
Describe methods of DNA repair (excision repair,
photoreactivation, RecA induced repair, SOS repair).
Recognize traits that are inherited in a non-Mendelian
fashion (maternal effects, cytoplasmic inheritance) based on data supplied.
Use Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium to calculate
allelic frequencies given genotypic frequencies, or calculate genotypic
frequencies given allelic frequencies.
State the assumptions of Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium.
Identify if a gene pool is in Hardy-Weinberg
equilibrium.
Describe the following in the context of Hardy-Weinberg
equilibrium: sampling error, genetic drift, founder effect, bottleneck,
mutational equilibrium, natural selection.
