Letter to a Biology Student

Dear Biology Student, 

     My name is Monica Stratakos, and I took biology as a freshman when I was fourteen. Last year, I went to Redwood Middle School. This year, I took Health/Drivers Ed first semester in Mr. Lugo's class. Second semester I took World Geo with Mr. Dwyer. I also took Algebra 2 Honors with Mrs. Troxell. I took Spanish 2 with Mrs. Voorhees, and I had Mr. Rector for English. I missed a lot of school for second semester due to out of state national tournaments, so I still had a lot of missing assignments at the end of the school year. Outside of school, I play a lot of tennis. On the first day, I did not expect to have anything to do besides get the syllabus for each class.

     Mr. Orre expects you to be on time with your notebook out, and working on your "do now." A usual class day consists of reviewing the previous night's vodcast with your group, and then do a lab that relates to the vodcast. It is expected that you have your notebook everyday and you are ready to work when the second bell rings. For labs, we usually review the lab as a class, then do the lab and a write-up on blogger. The write-ups are usually fifty points. Homework usually takes fifteen minutes for the vodcast and CFU. If you put him on 2.0 speed, it usually takes a shorter amount of time. Most vodcasts are between ten and twenty minutes long. I do not remember taking any quizzes in this class. Tests are always multiple choice. At the end of the second semester, my average test grade was an 80. The notebook consistes of the table of contents, vodcasts, and DO NOW's. My blog ( http://monicabio9.blogspot.com/ ) consisted of all the labs and unit reflections from first and second semester.  My favorite blog was the pGLO lab ( http://monicabio9.blogspot.com/2017/01/pglo-lab.html ). I really liked this lab because the bacteria glowed a green-white color, and I took some really nice photos. Over the course of the year, I got more responsible with my homework. I did 75% of homework first semester, and second semester I did 90%. 

     Mr. Orre hates phones out in class, and talking when he is talking. To earn a good grade on assignments, be sure to fill in all the required parts. Homework is very important in this class because it is almost the same percent of your grade as tests. To get the most out of Mr. Orre's class, actually watch his vodcasts the day before and do the CFU. I think I should have studied a little earlier for tests. I always studied the night before, but I know I could have done better. Also, when I was absent, I was more than five vodcasts behind. I should have done them before I got to class because I had no idea what was happening in class.
     Overall, I had a very fun time in this class. I liked most of the labs except the pig dissection. Next year, I am taking Chemistry Honors because I think I will have a fun time in that class. Good luck this school year!!!

From,
Monica Stratakos

Pig Dissection

The purpose of this Pig Dissection was to understand the body structure. This unit was about homeostasis, the digestive system, the circulatory system, the respiratory system, the nervous system, the endocrine system, and the immune system. After cutting open the pig, my group and I identified the specific parts of our pig. We also cut the heart open to identify the four parts of the heart, which I learned in the circulatory and respiratory system vodcast. Oxygen-poor blood enters the right atrium from the body through the superior and inferior vena cava. From the right atrium, it then goes to the right ventricle through the tricuspid valve. Then, it goes to the lungs through the pulmonary valve to the pulmonary artery. Oxygen rich blood from the lungs enters the left atrium and goes through the left ventricle and leaves to the body through the aorta. My favorite part of the dissection was before the pig was cut open because I got a little bit dizzy when i saw the pig get cut open. I think this dissection was a valuable experience because it proves that I will not be a doctor when i grow up because I can not handle blood or cut open organs.

Here is our youtube video:

20 time individual reflection

Our 20 time project was about pollution. We gathered information to see how many people knew that pollution was hurting our Earth. At first, we tried to raise money by selling boba at our school. We planned to put stickers about pollution on the drinks, and donate the money to a pollution fund. We could not do this because we had to be part of a club to sell anything at our school. Instead, we made posters and a survey. We placed the posters around San Jose. Over 150 people took the survey from across the country and Hong Kong. I had many friends from Texas, New York, Florida, and many parts of Southern California take the quiz and a lot of them had no idea how bad our Earth was doing. I asked a lot of people from tennis to take the survey and most had no idea how much the world was being polluted. 52% of the people surveyed were a little concerned about global warming. 69% of the 150 surveyed said they wanted to help save the Earth. About 3/4 of the people knew that the living condition of the environment would be worse for the coming generation. 84% believed that the global temperature had risen from the 1800s. If I could do this project again, Vivienne and I would definitely set up a clean up to raise more awareness. After learning about pollution, I cut down on how much trash my family and I produce, trying to use less plastic and recycle more. I have learned that batteries are actually recyclable. Before this project, I put used batteries in the garbage.

Vivienne and I will continue this project by raising more awareness and possibly scheduling a clean up.

Unit 9 Reflection

http://bit.ly/2r1bqcm

This picture shows the diffferent levels of taxonomy.
The levels get smaller near the bottom because it is
more specific towards one species

http://bit.ly/2r82L4r

This shows the historyof the Earth in a 24-hour time period

Unit 9 was called "What on Earth Evolved". I learned about the different levels of taxonomy. The taxonomic levels are (from most inclusive to least inclusive): domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species. The three domains are: bacteria, archaea, and eukarya. Protists, fungi, plants, and animals belong to the domain eukarya. The kingdom protista are diverse, unicellular or mulitcellular, plants or animals. Some examples of protists are:  slime molds, red algae, paramecium, and amoeba. The kingdom fungi consists of heterotrophic decomposers that can be unicellular or multicellular. They can bee found in all habitats on Earth (ex. mushrooms, yeasts, molds, and lichens). Non-vascular, vascular seedless pants, and seed plants make up the plantae kingdom. Mosses, ferns, lilies, and oak all belong to the plantae kingdom. The kingdom animalia consists of multicelluular consumers and heterotrophs. Some examples are: sponges, jellyfish, earthworms, sea stars, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals.


My previous post was the "Geologic Timeline Reflection"( http://monicabio9.blogspot.com/2017/04/geologic-timeline-reflection.html ). This post explained that the Earth is 4.543 billion years old. Many animals existed before humans. Humans have only been on the Earth for 200,000 years. Animals like the tiktaalik lived 375 million years ago. Dinosaurs lived between 230 and 65 million years ago. Humans are just a small fraction of life.

I am still a little confused about why scientists some scientist like to clump species together, while others like to have subspecies. I think it would be a lot easier if there were no subspecies because it gets very confusing.

I think I did pretty well on my What on Earth Evolved presentation. Mine was about the tiktaalik, which was one of the first land animals. I think I could have made my speech a little bit longer, but other than that, everything ran smoothly. This was a really good assignment to practice my public speaking. In the future, I think I will elaborate more on my slides and not read directly off the slides.


Here is my What on Earth Evolved Presentation:

Geologic Timeline Reflection

The Cambrian Explosion is a sudden appearance in the fossil record of complex animals that had mineralized skeletal remains. This is considered to be the most important evolutionary event in the history of life on Earth. 96% of species became extinct after the Permian mass extinction. There were at least two or more phases of extinction over the span of millions of years. This was the the insect population's one and only mass extinction. This tragic event may have been caused by an asteroid impact or a drop in oxygen levels. 65 million years ago, the dinosaurs died in Cretaceous mass extinction. This mass extinction may have been caused by flood basalt eruptions affecting the world's climate, and a drastic fall in sea level.

The Earth is approximately 4.543 billion years old. The Silurian Extinction happened 439 million years ago. Dinosaurs lived between 230 and 65 million years ago in the Mesozoic Era. This was millions of years before the first homo sapien appeared. Modern humans evolved 200,000 years ago. Compared to the Earth, humans are a relatively new species. If the timeline of Earth was based off a one year calendar with the Big Bang occurring on January 1, humans have only been around for about five minutes. I was surprised that we have impacted the world so much in the five minutes that humans have been on the Earth.

The last 200,000 years have been mainly dominated by humans. In the past 50 years, humans have burned tons and tons of fossil fuels. The human society has also dumped massive amounts of trash into landfills and oceans. With all the technologies we have created to change the Earth for the better, we have dumped so much waste that the Earth might never recover.

My question is "How do scientists know what happened in every mass extinction?"

Earth life in 24 hours

Unit 8 Reflection

This unit was about constant change. Variation is any difference in traits within a population such as height or eye color. Variation exists because of crossing over, meiosis, mutations, and sex. Artificial selection occurs when humans select traits from a population's variation that they want, and only mate individuals with those traits. Darwin discovered that evolution is caused by natural selection. He came p with for observations and two conclusions explaining how populations can change or evolve over time because of natural selection. A gene is a section of DNA that gives instructions for a trait. An allele is different variations of a gene that give different variations of that trait. Genetic variation is stored in the gene pool, and these gene pools can change over time. Allele frequency is how common an allele is in a population. Evolution acts on a population, as natural selection acts on an individual. A species is a group of individuals that can reproduce and have fertile offspring. Speciation is the rise of two or more species from one existing species. Embryology is the similar stages of embryo development that suggest common ancestry. Gene flow is moving alleles from one population to another. Natural selection selects for traits advantageous for survival. The 4 eras are: Precambrian Era, Paleozic Era, Mesozoic Era, and Cenozoic Era.

This is a picture of my graph from the Hunger Games
 Lab. It shows the gene flow in the population.

This is an image of gene flow. It shows how
the alleles move from one population to another.

I want to learn more about the rate of evolution because it is very slow for some populations and not for others. I would like to know how to increase the rate of evolution because some species have a very slow rate of evolution. Since my reflection on Unit 7 ( https://monicabio9.blogspot.com/2017/03/unit-7-reflection.html ) I have tried to focus more on not being so passive agressive. I have tired to consider both sides of the argument and not be mad about which was the argument went. 

Hunger Games Final Analysis

1. I was not here for the Hunger Games Lab, but I was able to get data from a team member. In this lab, students tried to survive and reproduce. This simulates evolution. 
2. Pinchers were the best at capturing food because they could use their thumb and index finger.
3. The population did evolve. In the beginning, the "A" allele had a frequency of 52%, and the "a" allele had a frequency of 48%. At the end of the lab, the "A" allele had a frequency of 23%, and the "a" allele had a frequency of 77%.
4. The placement of the food and the amount needed to survive was random. The genotype was also random because it was based off of a coin flip. The way that a person picked up food was nonrandom. This could have effected the population because there were no favored genotypes. 
5. If there was less food, the results would be different because there would be more of a fight for survival with the same amount of people and less food. This would lead to less people surviving. On the other hand, if there was more food, people wouldn't have to fight for survival as much, and therefore more people would survive. If there is a fire, there would be less acorns for a population of squirrels to eat, which would lead to the survival of the fittest.
6. The results would be different if there was not incomplete dominance. Without incomplete dominance, there would be no knucklers which would lead to more stumpys.
7. Natural selection is the process of weeding out phenotypes in a population that don't help individuals survive which leads to populations evolving overtime. Evolution is the process by which a population improves its gene pool. Evolution is caused by natural selection.
8. The stumpys were the best at strategizing. They reproduced only with each other, which made their population bounce back.
9. In evolution, the population evolves. Natural selection acts on the pheontype because it acts on the traits.
10. How quickly does evolution occur?

Unit 7 Reflection

Unit 7 was about the study of ecology. Ecology is the study of interactions between organisms and their environment. A habitat is a place that includes all aspects of an area where an organism lives including biotic and abiotic factors. Biotic factors are living things. The root word "bio" means living. Abiotic factors are non-living things. The levels of organization are: organism, population, community, ecosystem, and biome/biosphere. Producers provide energy for other organisms in an ecosystem, while consumers get their energy from eating living or once-living resources. A food chain shows how each organism gets its energy.

This is a picture of a food web. There are more primary producers than tertiary
consumers because the higher up the food web, the more scarce the organism is.

This is a picture of a food chain. It is not as complicated as a food web.

 Primary producers are  the source of all energy in an ecosystem. The 10% rule states that with the amount of energy produced at each level, only 10% is passed on to the next level. The other 90% is lost as waste. An energy pyramid shows how energy is transferred from producers up the food chain to top level consumers. Population ecology is the study of populations in relation to the environment. Succession is the sequence of community and ecosystem changes after a disturbance. Primary succession occurs where succession begins with no soil to start with. Secondary succession begins in an area where soil remains after a disturbance. Biodiversity is the total number of species in an ecosystem. Genetic diversity is all the different genes within a population and between different populations. Species diversity is the variety of species in an ecosystem and throughout the biosphere. Ecosystem diversity is the different types of ecosystems throughout the planet. Biodiversity is threatened due to habitat loss, introduced species, over exploitation, and change in climate.

I really enjoyed watching the movie "Bag It" in class. There were many interesting facts about plastic and how much gets wasted annually. Before watching this video, I never really thought about plastic and the effect it had on other organisms. After watching the movie I went home and looked up more interesting facts about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This patch is located between Hawaii and Japan. Since the plastic is not biodegradable, it breaks down into smaller pieces called mircoplastics. It is said that 70% of the garbage is below the water, so no one knows how much trash is really in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Our biology conservation project was about the Artic Tundra. I really liked working in a group to complete this project because it was fun to learn about this cold and dry place with others. We were able to finish our project before the break so we had no time pressure to submit it on time. We had a bit of trouble getting the audio to work with our video, but other than that, our project had no other major problems. I learned that there are many endangered species in the Artic Tundra including: polar bears, arctic foxes and beluga whales. Our group collaborated well through facebook messenger. Here is a link to our video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0rHk8eio-sFaDlVNXY2NEhoTUU/view?usp=sharing

My dominant conflict style was passive aggressive. I like to indirectly resist the demands of others. If i get in an argument, I usually let the other person win. After letting the other person choose what the want to do, I usually hold a grudge and make sure that the other person knows. I can be more assertive by trying not to hold a grudge and just let the argument go.

Unit 6 Reflection

     This unit was about was about biotechnology and its purpose. Biotechnology is the study of living things in order to benefit mankind. The four applications of biotechnology are industrial/environmental (converting sugars into acids through the process of fermentation), medical/pharmaceutical (putting in a healthy copy of a gene into cells of a defective gene through gene therapy), agricultural (genetic modified organisms or GMO), and diagnostic (searching for genes or DNA segments indicating risk for diseases through the process of genetic testing).

     The polymerase chain reaction, also known as PCR, is a procedure used to amplify a specific DNA region. Gel electrophoresis uses electricity to separate DNA fragments based on size. Sequencing is a process that determines the exact order of a given DNA strand.
     Recombinate DNA Technology (rDNA) inserts DNA of one organism into DNA of another organism. This process is often described as genetic engineering. 
     Bioethics is the study of decision making as it applies to moral decisions that have to be made because of advances in biology, medicine, or technology.       I really enjoyed this unit because it was very hands on and had a lot of interesting labs. My favorite lab was the pGLO lab because the result was really interesting. 

This is a picture of the container that had LB, AMP, and ARA.

This is a picture of the gel electrophoresis lab with the gels loaded.

     I learned that when arabanose sugar is added to the bacteria E.coli, the bacteria glows green under UV light. The arabonose sugar is the trigger that makes the bacteria glow. The glowing florescent protein (GFP) is extracted from jellyfish.
     I really struggled to understand the last vodcast, the pGLO prelab vodcast. I was not really sure what the outcome of each of the plates were when i was watching the vodcast. After re-watching the vodcast, and doing the lab, I was able to understand the effects of arabanose sugar and its function.
     I wonder about the many jobs in the biotech world. I think some day in the near future, the world will be very advanced in biotech and become too advanced.

My new years goals were:

• Smart Goal #1:

I will start studying at least 5 days before every test I take, and take notes when I am studying. To make sure I achieve this goal, I will set reminders on my phone. Since I like to procrastinate a lot I will have to pretend that the test is the next day so I can actually study.

• Smart Goal #2:

I will try my best in everything I do, and during lectures in class I will actively listen and make sure that I ask questions when I don't understand something. While I am actively listening, I will take notes and review the topics that I learned in class while completing my homework.

     So far, I have achieved smart goal 1 and 2. I have been taking notes while i was studying, and I completed my textbooks early in the unit. Also, I have been paying attention in class and participating. I think that I set good and reasonable goals that will challenge me to do my best throughout this semester.

pGLO Lab

Plate	Number of Colonies	Color of colonies under room light	Color of colonies under   UV light
- pGLO LB	0	none	none
- pGLO LB/amp	none	none	none
+ pGLO LB/amp	2	white/clear	white/clear
+ pGLO LB/amp/ara	At least 4	white/clear	bright green

          2. The two new traits that the transformed bacteria have are: the ability to glow under UV light and ampicillin resistance.

          3.  I think there were millions of bacteria in the 100 uL of bacteria that was spread on each plate because bacteria are very small in size, many bacteria could be found in a little amount of E.coli.

          4. The rold of arabinose in the plates was to activate the gene that makes the bacteria glow green when UV light is present.

         5.  a)GFP can be used to dye cancer cells and shbow images of them

              b) GFP can show if the bacteria took a new gene properly

              c) GFP can show if someone had a drug overdose

         

         6. Genetic engineering can be used to create genetically modified crops. Corn, papaya, cotton, and soy are all at a high risk for being genetically modified. Crops are genetically modified to increase the resistance against a disease in a crop.

Candy Electrophoresis Lab

1. The reference blue dye was way behind and the actual blue dye from the candy. All the reference dye fell off because during the experiment, our class went to an assembly. We did not come back from the assembly in time. I did not see any dyes that were a different color than any of the reference bands.  There were no dyes that moved in the wrong direction.

2. The "fast green FCF" looked like the Blue 1 that I examined in the lab. They had similar chemical compositions, and their structures also looked very alike. The "citrus red 2" looks very similar to the Red 40 that I used in the lab. Although these dyes did not have the same composition, their structures were still similar.

3. I think that dog food manufactures such as Beneful and Snausages Breakfast Bites have food dyes in their product becuase dogs prefer more colorful food. If the food did not have a good taste, but it was colored like a dog treat, I think a dog would get tricked by the color of the food and still eat it.

4. I think that an artificial food color would be preferable to a natural food color because artificial food colors have more sugar, and therefore taste better than a natural food color.

5. The two factors that control the distance the colored dye solutions migrate are the charge of the dye and the length. If the DNA segment is longer, then it will travel slower. If the DNA segment is shorter, it will travel quicker.

6. Electricity is the force that helps the dyes move through the gel. Once the dyes are put in the gel, I turned on the electrical force.

7. The gel causes the molecules to separate by size because it takes the longer DNA more time to go through the gel. The shorter DNA has an easier time getting through the gel because it has to go through small sections of the gel.

8. The DNA of molecules with molecular weights of 600, 1000, 2000, and 5000 daltons would separate from lightest to heaviest. This means that the DNA with the molecular weight of 600 would go through the gel first, followed by the 1000 and 2000 weights. The 5000 weight would finish last because it weighs the most, making it the slowest.

New Year Goals

• Smart Goal #1:

I will start studying at least 5 days before every test I take, and take notes when I am studying. To make sure I achieve this goal, I will set reminders on my phone. Since I like to procrastinate a lot I will have to pretend that the test is the next day so I can actually study.

• Smart Goal #2:

I will try my best in everything I do, and during lectures in class I will actively listen and make sure that I ask questions when I don't understand something. While I am actively listening, I will take notes and review the topics that I learned in class while completing my homework.