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UNIT PROJECT WORKSHEET

Investigating the Heredity of Disease
About 30,000 Americans have Huntington’s disease (HD), in addition to
POSSIBLE MATERIALS
many more people worldwide. It causes degeneration of brain cells, called
neurons, in parts of the brain that control a person’s movement, along with • beads or clay, colored
other areas. It is a progressive disease, meaning that it gets worse over • colored pencils
time, and it runs in families. Huntington’s disease leads an affected person • paper
to have uncontrolled movements (called chorea), abnormal posture, and • scissors
changes in behavior and cognition. It usually begins between ages 30 and
50. Another form, called juvenile Huntington’s disease, occurs under age
20. Symptoms of juvenile HD are a little different from adult onset and
include unsteadiness, rigidity, difficulty at school, and seizures.

Over the course of this project, you will research the nature and causes of
Huntington’s disease.

PREDICT
1. Do you think people with Huntington’s disease usually have a family member or an ancestor
with the disease?
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2. Do you think that environmental factors are a cause of HD?
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3. What evidence do you need to gather to answer Questions 1 and 2?
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PROCEDURE
1. Come up with a central question about the causes and the treatments of Huntington’s
disease. This question will guide your research.

2. Make a list of questions about the disease that a scientist may ask to learn more about the
mechanics of the disease.

3. Compare notes with your peers. What questions do you have in common? Modify or add to
your list of questions.

Unit Project Worksheet 1 Genetics and Heredity

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4. Research causes, treatments, and other factors associated with Huntington’s disease. Be
sure to use multiple, reliable sources.

5. Present your findings in a table, a graph, or a model. Compare your results with your peers.
Below is an example of table headings. (Your table or other presentation may vary.) These
results will help you model meiosis and perform other activities later on.

When do How many More prevalent in Possible causes What are some
symptoms first people have it? one sex, race, or treatments?
appear? other group?
Hungtington’s
Disease (Adult
Onset)
Juvenile
Huntington’s
Disease

DATA COLLECTION
You will research and collect information about Huntington’s disease. Include sample data tables,
and explain which data you can graph at the end of the investigation.

Examples of qualitative information to collect:

• symptoms associated with Huntington’s disease
• treatments for symptoms of HD
• other information, such as well-known people who have developed HD
• how/when the disease was first “discovered” and named
• information about how HD is caused
• similarities to other diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s

Examples of quantitative information:

• the total number of people affected by Huntington’s disease in the United States and the
incidence of the disease
• at what age the disease typically presents itself
• life expectancy

LESSON 1: MEIOSIS
Use beads, clay, or other materials to model or simulate meiosis and how mutations can be passed
down to gametes.

Answer the following questions in your Evidence Notebook:

1. Can mutations be passed down in gametes from parents to children? How does your model
support your claim?

2. Predict What do you think causes Huntington’s disease, based on what you know so far?

Unit Project Worksheet 2 Genetics and Heredity

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LESSON 2: MENDEL AND HEREDITY

Revise your model/simulation from Lesson 1 to include mechanisms of inheritance, and determine
what inheritance pattern Huntington’s seems to follow.

Analyze the data about this hypothetical family, and use it as you answer the questions that follow.

A woman has one copy of a mutated gene and develops Huntington’s disease. A man has two
copies of the normal gene and does not have HD. The man and woman have four children. One of
their children inherits a mutated gene and later in life shows signs of HD. The other three children do
not develop HD.

Answer the following questions in your Evidence Notebook:

1. How many genes must be affected to cause Huntington’s disease? What type of
chromosome is the gene located on, a sex chromosome or an autosomal chromosome? Is
HD a dominant, a recessive, or a codominant disorder?

2. How did the child in the example get HD?

LESSON 3: TRAITS AND PROBABILITY

Use Punnett squares to determine the probabilities of inheriting Huntington’s disease. You can
represent the Huntington’s disease mutation as uppercase H and the gene without the mutation as
lowercase h. Then return to your model, and modify it further to explain the probability of inheriting
HD and why probabilities can be different under different circumstances.

Answer the following questions in your Evidence Notebook:

1. What are the probabilities of a child inheriting Huntington’s disease when one parent is
heterozygous for HD? Two parents? How does your model show this?

2. Can a child typically develop HD even if neither of the parents have the mutated gene?

LESSON 4: MUTATIONS AND GENETIC DIVERSITY

Research the following questions using reliable sources, and record the findings in your Evidence
Notebook.

1. What type of gene mutation causes HD, and how often does the mutation occur?

2. What do we know about the cause of the gene mutation?

Synthesize the information you have researched. Then make a claim in your Evidence Notebook
about the mutation causing HD, supporting it with evidence from your research.

LESSON 5: GENETIC ENGINEERING

Research whether there is genetic testing for Huntington’s disease. Then work with a partner or
small groups to think about why people would want this testing and the possible tradeoffs in such a
decision. Pose questions and answer them in your Evidence Notebook.

1. Is there genetic testing for HD, and if so, what is tested for?

2. Why would a person want to test for HD, and how might it affect their decisions about
planning a family? Why might a person at risk for developing HD, because of family history,
choose not to be tested?

Unit Project Worksheet 3 Genetics and Heredity

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CONCLUDE
Write a conclusion demonstrating your findings in your Evidence Notebook. Include all data you
collected, and create at least one graphic representation of your data. In your conclusion, answer the
following questions:

1. What are the symptoms of Huntington’s disease, and when do they start to appear
(for both forms of HD)?

2. What causes HD?

3. What are some of the reasons people choose to be tested or not tested for the HD gene?

4. Why is genetic diversity important, and how might it be impacted by testing for HD and other
genetic disorders?

5. Do you think that genetic research will lead to a cure for HD, based on what you have read
and researched?

PRESENT
Develop a presentation that answers the questions from the beginning of this experiment:

1. Do people with Huntington’s disease usually have a family member or an ancestor

with the disease?

2. Do you think that environmental factors are a cause of HD?

3. What evidence do you need to gather to answer Questions 1 and 2?

Use evidence gathered over the course of the experiment to support your claims. Photos,
drawings, data tables, and graphs may be useful evidence to include in your presentation.

Unit Project Worksheet 4 Genetics and Heredity

Original content copyright © Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Alterations to the original content are the responsibility of the instructor.