Biology 140 Cracking the Code of Life Study Guide

1. Cracking the Code of Life – summary questions

a. How would the Human Genome Project be useful in preventing genetic diseases such as Tay Sachs disease
or Cystic Fibrosis?
b. Using the example of Tay Sachs disease, explain the effect of having a single nucleotide change in the gene.
What was the effect of the single nucleotide change? Why might a single nucleotide change not result in a
disease?
c. In the case of Tony and baby Riley, how is their cystic fibrosis the same and how is it different?
d. Why might researchers move their focus from the genome to the proteome?
2. Cracking the Code of Life Questions from the transcript
1. What is Tay Sachs disease? (1)

2. What is the genetic error of a baby with Tay Sachs and what effect does this error have in the brain of
the baby? (5)
3. What molecule is the narrator referring to when he says “one bad letter in the baby’s DNA”? (1)
4. Is there a cure for Tay Sachs? (1)
5. How does Tay Sachs progress? (4)
6. How is Tay Sachs inherited? (1)
7. How might the Human Genome Project help prevent a child from being born with Tay Sachs? (2)
8. Why is finding the genes for a disease not the same as finding a cure for a genetic disease? (1)
9. What are the signs of cystic fibrosis? (1)
10. When did researchers discover the gene for CF? (1)
11. After the discovery of the gene, what did people hope would happen? (2)
12. What is the importance of proteins in the human body? (2)
13. What is the importance of protein shape? (2)
14. What is the genetic error in CF patients? (1)
15. What is the effect of this error? (1)
16. What is the function of the normal protein? (1)
17. What is the problem with the protein in CF patients? (3)
18. What are researchers hoping to do with the proteins of CF patients? (1)
19. Why is it so challenging to understand protein shape and how proteins function compared to
understanding the information contained in our genes? (5)
20. What is different between the CF that Tony has and the CF that baby Riley has? (2)
21. What are the doctors and researchers thinking are helping Tony live longer and healthier than might
otherwise be expected in someone with CF? (1)
22. What is the Proteome? (1)
23. Why would we want to understand the proteome? (1)
24. How can humans be considerably more complex than the fruit fly even though we only have about
twice as many genes as the fruit fly? (3)
25. How would the Human Genome Project be useful in preventing genetic diseases such as Tay Sachs
disease or Cystic Fibrosis?
26. Using the example of Tay Sachs disease, explain the effect of having a single nucleotide change in the
gene. What was the effect of the single nucleotide change? Why might a single nucleotide change not
result in a disease?
27. In the case of Tony and baby Riley, how is their cystic fibrosis the same and how is it different?
28. Why might researchers move their focus from the genome to the proteome?

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