Author: Ashley Yeager
Summary:
The loblolly pine, Pinus taeda, supplies most of the paper products in the United States. It is a conifer tree that can grow up to 30 meters tall. Scientists recently finished mapping the loblolly genome, which has around 22 billion base pairs, about a year after announcing the project in 2013. The loblolly has even more DNA than the wheat plant, which had previously had the largest recorded genome at 17 billion base pairs. However, even though loblolly pines have a vast amount of DNA, the published genetic blueprints show that 82% of it is repeating information. Analysis also revealed DNA sequences in its genome that are related to resisting pathogens, which could further our knowledge on how loblollies and other pine trees fight disease.
Relevance:
In Term 2, we discussed DNA, genes, and genomes in class. A genome is the complete set of all the genetic material in an organism. This piece of news is about the sequencing of an organism's genome like in the Human Genome Project we read about, although this time, researchers were looking at pine trees instead of humans. The article compares the number of DNA base pairs in loblolly pines and wheat, as well as making a brief allusion to how DNA controls processes like fighting disease in an organism.
Yeager, Ashley. "Loblolly Sets Record for Biggest Genome." Science News. Society for
Science & the Public, 1 May 2014. Web. 11 Jan. 2015.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/loblolly-sets-record-biggest-genome?mode=pick&context=151
Relevance:
In Term 2, we discussed DNA, genes, and genomes in class. A genome is the complete set of all the genetic material in an organism. This piece of news is about the sequencing of an organism's genome like in the Human Genome Project we read about, although this time, researchers were looking at pine trees instead of humans. The article compares the number of DNA base pairs in loblolly pines and wheat, as well as making a brief allusion to how DNA controls processes like fighting disease in an organism.
Yeager, Ashley. "Loblolly Sets Record for Biggest Genome." Science News. Society for
Science & the Public, 1 May 2014. Web. 11 Jan. 2015.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/loblolly-sets-record-biggest-genome?mode=pick&context=151
Are most of the base pairs in wheat also repeating information?
ReplyDeleteYes, about 75% of the DNA in wheat are also repeating sequences. The link below has more specifics about the different percentages of their DNA.
Deletehttp://www.nature.com/hdy/journal/v37/n2/abs/hdy197685a.html
What would happen if this specific tree where to be affected by a widespread disease that would change the DNA and eventually kill the tree itself?
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if by "specific tree" you mean a literal single tree or that specific species. However, if by "widespread", you mean that it affects many members of that particular species, then I would assume that either natural selection would take place, where some individuals have a resistance to the disease and survive to reproduce until the majority, or all, of the rest would have the disease-resistant DNA, or the loblolly pine species would simply go extinct. I'm sorry, I don't really know what you mean by a disease that would change the DNA.
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