Completion Of The Human Genome Project example essay topic

Marshall, Elizabeth L. The Human Genome Project: Cracking The Code Within Us. New York, New York: Franklin Watts, 1996.1-128. Elizabeth L. Marshall was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She grew up in areas of southern California, and in parts of New York City. She lives in Columbus, Ohio, and is currently married and has two daughters. She attended and graduated from the University of Virginia with a B.A. in English.

She then graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a Master of Fine Arts degree in fictional writing. She has worked form several scientific journals and magazines and is a member of the National Association of Science Writers. She has also written several well known books including Conquering Infertility: Medical Challenges and Moral Dilemmas, and High-Tech Harvest. I chose this book because it seemed like an interesting topic, and because I thought it might help me understand more things about DNA.

Someone else who read it said that it had a lot to do with the things we covered in class too so I figured it would be as good a choice as any. This book is about the amazing task of mapping and showing all the sequences of the thousands and thousands of genes in the human body. The book is split up into nine chapters each of which covers a different aspect of this incredible project. The book tells all about almost every aspect of the project. It tells all about the project and what the point is, what has been accomplished so far, and when they expect it to be finished.

According to the introduction the project is actually expected to be finished sometime this year. The first chapter starts off with the basic structure of DNA and describes how the base pairing of each nucleotide creates each amino acid, which when all put together create a strand of DNA. It also gives an idea of who is working on the project. She lists several major cities where the project is being worked on and then goes on to explain how between all these different teams, who are all working on some different aspect of the project, there are also anywhere from 200 to 400 other smaller teams all around the country working on it. The next chapter is about chromosome 18, and how a slight mistake in it can cause things like mental retardation and deafness, and what they are trying to do to help stop or fix chromosome 18 deletion syndrome.

The third chapter covers how the human genome project can benefit cystic fibrosis victims by discovering the cystic fibrosis gene and finding out what they can do about it. Chapter 4 talks about the government side of the project and the involvement of the Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health. It also gives an excellent overview of all the technology involved and being developed for this project. It also explains how all the different discoveries from the hundreds of different labs working on this huge project are kept track of and made available among each other.

The fifth chapter talks about how the project is not just for humans, but also for 5 other species including rats and mice. The sixth chapter talks about Physician David Asch's opinions of genetic engineering, and about the affects the project has on peoples lives. He talks about the moral issues of genetic testing and how the information from this project could be misused, or could create moral dilemmas. Chapter 7 called "The Big Picture" is exactly that. It gives a simple, and in-depth breakdown of what the Human Genome Project is for, and what it can do to benefit us.

Chapter 8 talks more about other people involved in the project, and talks more about how better understanding of DNA could help scientists develop cures to diseases such as cancer. The final chapter talks about all the benefits that can come from the completion of the Human Genome Project, and gives several fictional instances of futuristic plot lines and what the understanding from this project could theoretically do in these story lines. 10 Scientific Terms 1. Adenine - 1 of the 4 nucleotide bases found in DNA 2.

Amino Acid - The building blocks of proteins. There are twenty different amino acids. 3. Crossing Over - Exchange of DNA between a pair of chromosomes 4.

Intron - A non-protein-coding region of a gene 5. Human Genome - A complete set of all the genes of a human 6. Deletion - A missing section of DNA on a chromosome 7. Exon - Protein-coding region of a gene 8. Heredity - The transmission of traits from parent to child via genes 9.

Polymorphism - Differences among individuals in DNA sequences 10. Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism - Variation in the DNA sequence that can be identified with restriction enzymes. Major Terms - The Human Genome Project is the national effort coordinated by the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Energy to develop the tools and techniques needed to map and sequence all the genes of humans plus five other species. DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) - The molecule that carries genetic heritage. DNA is a two-stranded molecule that is twisted into a double helix. Gene A segment if DNA that contains the blueprint for a protein.

Through the action of their proteins, genes govern inherited traits like physical appearance. Humans have anywhere between fifty-thousand and one-hundred-thousand genes. Since there is a large part of the book devoted to how the human genome project can affect our lives, I will try not to say to much so as not to take away from the book. The completion of the Human Genome Project will benefit us in many ways, It will help develop cures for many diseases, and will give us a better understanding of what controls our appearance, intelligence, and any other aspects controlled by genes. I would give this book an eight on a scale of one to ten. It definitely gives what it promises, and it makes what is obviously a very, very difficult project a better setting that is more relatable to our everyday lives.

It answers almost any questions you could have about the project and who is in charge of it, who is involved in it, and who is paying for it. It also gives plenty of information on the benefits that it could have on our society, but also admits it could cause several moral or ethical problems. The book defines everything in simple terms and makes the facts easy to understand. It doesn't confuse you with its explanations of anything, and it doesn't just stay on the side of how good the Human Genome Project is. It gives a very straight-forward and fair explanation of everything that can come, and everything that is expected to come from the projects completion (set for 2005). It is a very well written book that never makes you question anything it says because it gives all sides to any arguments.

There is no movie or documentary about this book that I could find. If I documentary were made it wouldn't be very difficult to do since there is so much information out there about this subject, and there are so many people and countries taking part in it. For the narrator I would use Sean Connery because he just has the perfect voice for anything. It would most likely be shown as a late night documentary because if I've learned anything from spending so much time in front of the television informational documentaries that aren't about famous people, drugs, or violence don't usually get many primetime slots. But whether it was shown at noon or midnight, it would still be a very interesting documentary because of how much it has to do with your life in the future as technology keeps developing. I would recommend this book to a friend assuming they had some sort of interest in anything it talked about, because it is a good book and is surprisingly addictive once you start.