PROBLEM: If trisected, which piece of a planarian will regenerate first?
HYPOTHESIS: If trisected, then the head will regenerate first.
THEORY: Planaria are flat worms that can reproduce either sexually or asexually. Planaria are a hermaphrodites which mean that they both planaria contain female and male reproductive parts. These reproductive parts are called gonads. When they reproduce sexually, two planarian exchange sperm and the sperm then travels up their ovaries. Once they sperm travels to their ovaries, they go there separate ways and lay eggs. When the condition is less ideal, then planaria can reproduce asexually.
Planaria have the ability to produce asexually. When planaria reproduce asexually it only requires one planarian then two. The two methods are fragmentation, and spontaneous tailing dropping. During the process of spontaneous tailing dropping, the planarian drop their tails in stagent water. When they drop their tails, a planaria will start to grow from that tail and the planarian will regenerate a new tail. On the other hand, the process of fragmentation occurs when the planarian splits itself into three different sections. Then, the three sections of the planaria regenerate into new planarians. These planarians will be clones of the original one. These two methods are effective but not as effective as sexual reproduction. Asexual reproduction is more time consuming but is still a method that many planaria use.
Neoblasts are undifferentiated stem cells that allow the planaria to regenerate. Neoblasts are basically stem cells and stem cells are undifferentiated cells of a multicellular organism. Most planaria are made of toti-potent cells, which are cells that are capable of becoming any cell. When the planarian regenerates the neoblastas start to blastima the wound, which means cluster around the wound. Then, the cells begin to divide and differentiate. When they start to do that, a new planarian will start to regenerate. It will contain 30% of the neoblasts from the other planarian. In my hypothesis I thought that the head would regenerate the fastest the head is the main controller of the body, so it would regenerate the fastest.
DATA:
CONCLUSION:
In this lab we trisected a planarian to see what section will regenerate the fastest. I hypothesized that the head would regenerate the fastest than the mid section and the posterior. My data shows by day 3 the most pigmentation was showing and the anterior, was growing much faster than the mid section and the anterior. 8% of our classes planarias anterior grew the fastest out of 45. For our 1 st
period class, 54% out of 51 planarians mid sections grew the fastest and 38% of students in my class hypothesized that the posterior will regenerate the fastest. In conclusion, I hypothesized that the anterior will regenerate the fastest; according to the data my hypothesis was incorrect.
ANALYSIS:
Our results were invalid because when I predicted that the anterior would regenerate the fastest, but it turned out that the posterior regenerated faster. Only 38% of the 7 th grade chose that the posterior would regenerate the fastest. I thought that this was odd because only 38% of the 1 st period class only chose that the posterior would regenerate the fastest compared to the whole 7 th grade which 14% of everyone chose. I also thought that it was odd because 49% of everyone in the 7 th
grade chose that the mid section would regenerate the fastest. In conclusion there were many discrepancies in my prediction.