Download Engineer A Crop

Name __________________________
Engineer A Crop
Go to: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/harvest/engineer/
1. How have humans been engineering plants for almost 10,000 years?
2. What other method has been used for altering the genetic makeup of crops?
3. How can scientists quickly produce a change in an organism today?
Click on “Transgenic Manipulation” on the right.
4. How is a transgenic plant created?
5. What are you going to use in the simulation to produce an insect-resistant plant?
Click Begin.
6. Step 1: Take the toxin gene from a stretch of Bt DNA and combine it with a ________________.
7. Complete Step 1. What is a vector?
8. Click Ok. Step 2: Add the vector to the bacterium. How is the vector going to be able to get into a plant
cell now that it’s inside the bacteria?
9. Click Ok. Step 3: Move the bacteria to the growth medium.
10. Click Ok. Step 4: Add pieces of the tomato plant’s leaf to the bacteria. Explain what happens when you
add the leaf pieces to the bacteria and the bacteria’s DNA enters the nucleus of the leaf cell.
11. Click Ok. Step 5: Move the plant cells to the growth medium for plants. What does the growth medium
allow the plants to do?
12. Click Ok. Step 6: Spray herbicide on the plant cuttings. What does this do to the plant cells?
13. Click Ok. Step 7: Transfer the plant to the growth chamber.
14. Click Ok. Step 8: Examine the plant to determine if it has the desired trait. What will indicate that you
were successful at incorporating the Bt gene into the tomato plant? WHY will this indicate success?