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biological sciences year 1 > biotechnology > Flashcards

biotechnology Flashcards

1
Q

Why are plants important?

A

biodiversity, paper/wood products, textiles/fibres, food and fodder, pharmaceuticals, petroleum substitutes, amenity

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2
Q

What is plant biotechnology?

A

plant cell factories, plant tissue cultures, transgenic plants, molecular breeding, food processing, plant breeding and wine making

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3
Q

What was the green revolution?

A

a planned international effort in the 1970s to increase crop yield through: new crop cultivars, irrigation, fertilisers, pesticides, mechanisation

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4
Q

What did the green revolution do?

A

reduced chronic hunger from 40% to 20% of the world population while the population has double and saved millions of hectares of land from cultivation

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5
Q

What did plant breeding and the green evolution achieve?

A

faster growth, semi dwarf habit (strong stems that don’t fall over), higher yield, disease resistance, adaptability to local conditions

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6
Q

How can biotechnology help?

A

some plants can be regenerated from a cutting. many plants can regenerate from a few cells but only if the right hormones are provided

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7
Q

How can biotechnology help?

A

some plants can be regenerated from a cutting. many plants can regenerate from a few cells but only if the right hormones are provided

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8
Q

Why is plant tissue culture useful?

A

micropropagation, eliminating systemic viruses

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9
Q

What is molecular breeding?

A

find a DNA marker that is closely linked to the fruit character, follow it in the progeny of a cross, use the marker to identify the seedlings that will bear a certain fruit

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10
Q

What is molecular breeding?

A

find a DNA marker that is closely linked to the fruit character, follow it in the progeny of a cross, use the marker to identify the seedlings that will bear a certain fruit

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11
Q

How do we find the markers for molecular breeding?

A

generate a fingerprint of the parent plant using random DNA markers, find markers that are linked to the phenotype, check that the linkage is close, use markers to identify the plants at the seedling stage

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12
Q

What is protoblast fusion?

A

treat plant tissue with enzymes to remove cell wall, create protoblasts, fuse protoblasts with different genotypes, use polyethylene glycol or electric pulse, tool for creating wide crosses between similar but different species

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13
Q

What is embryo rescue?

A

culture embryos that would otherwise die

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14
Q

How to use plant cells as factories?

A

understand the biochemistry, find the genes, express them in the plant cells, harvest the chemicals

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15
Q

What are problems to overcome using plant cells as factories?

A

they might de-differentiate so changes in gene expressed, changes in enzymes produced and changes in metabolites produced

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16
Q

What is the percentage of essential drugs that are exclusively of flowering plant origin?

A

11% of 252

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17
Q

What is taxol?

A

potent anti-cancer drug which binds microtubules and stops cell division

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18
Q

How is plant transformation done?

A

assemble a transgene in a bacterial plasmid, transfer to the plant genome, select plants with new traits

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19
Q

How is plant transformation done using Agrobacterium tumefaciens?

A

it is a plant pathogen who’s disease is crown gall, bacterium delivers its own plasmid DNA into plant genome, one gene codes for an enzyme to make the plant hormone cytokinin - replace genes which cause crown gall with transgenes and insert these into plant chromosomes

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20
Q

What is Agrobacterium leaf disc transfer?

A

put transgene into Agrobacterium, incubate Agrobacterium with the leaf discs, move leaf discs onto selective medium, wait for shoots and roots to develop, grow plants on to maturity

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21
Q

How are plants regenerated from tissue culture?

A

incubate leaf with discs of Agrobacterium, balance cytokinin and auxin, add more cytokinin to induce shoot growth, add more auxin to induce root growth, transfer to soil and gradually reduce humidity

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22
Q

What is a transgene?

A

it is made up of a promotor (can only come from something that will react with plant machinery) and a coding region (from any organism)

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23
Q

How is a transgene assembled?

A

inside a plasmid, promotor and coding region are spliced together to form a transgene which is then transferred to the plant genome

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24
Q

How can GM plants help?

A

increased crop plant yields due to protection from pests and pathogens, improvement of nutritional qualities (vitamins, proteins, antioxidants), new products (vaccines, plastics)

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25
Q

How much do pests and pathogens reduce crop yield by?

A

30%

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26
Q

How much does insect damage reduce crops by?

A

13%

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27
Q

What bacterium is toxic to insects and why?

A

Bacillus thuringiensis because it produces protein crystals

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28
Q

How can this be used to make plants resistant to insects?

A

Bt toxic proteins identified, genes isolated, cloned into plasmids, transformed into plants

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29
Q

How can a plant be protected from potato virus Y?

A

clone virus protein coat, transform into plants, causes protection and healthy crop

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30
Q

What does vitamin A deficiency cause?

A

blindness

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31
Q

What is rice very poor in>

A

beta carotene needed for synthesis of vitamin A

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32
Q

How many children go blind every year?

A

250,000-500,000

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33
Q

How can rice be engineered to produce beta carotene?

A

using cloned genes from two species: Phytoene synthases from Narcissus pseudonarcissus and phytoene desaturase from the bacterium Erwinia udredovora. These produce beta carotene in the endosperm

34
Q

How many amino acids can humans synthesise?

A

10

35
Q

How can humans get more amino acids?

A

identified proteins rich in methionine -> engineered into soybean. identified proteins rich in lysine -> engineered into rice

36
Q

What do plants produce that gives fruit red to purple colour?

A

anthocyanins which are polyphenols that act as antioxidants and protect against cancer

37
Q

How are anthocyanins used to be consumed by more people?

A

they engineered tomatoes to produce more anthocyanins

38
Q

What are plant derived vaccines?

A

edible vaccines - best plants: tomato, banana

39
Q

What are advantages of plant derived vaccines?

A

no purification needed, easy to harvest, can be stored dried, not contamination with pathogens, no syringes

40
Q

What are problems to overcome with plant derived vaccines?

A

efficiency of expression, regulatory issues, clinical trials

41
Q

How can biodegradable plastic be made?

A

transgenic plant can produce polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB) however there are difficulties extracting it from the plant

42
Q

What could be the effects of the spread of transgenes?

A

weeds could gain a selective advantages, crop mixing?, effects on wildlife? beneficial insects could be affected

43
Q

Are GM foods safe?

A

they could possibly be harmful

44
Q

What two Nobel prizes were awarded for their contribution towards biotechnology and genetic engineering?

A

two scientists - CRISPR Cas9 in 2020. in 2018, three scientists won for genetic manipulation of phage’s that have the ability to express the desired protein inside a bacterium

45
Q

What is acetic acid bacteria used for?

A

to produce vinegar. they oxidise sugars or ethanol and produce acetic acid during fermentation

46
Q

What else can acetic acid bacteria produce?

A

It can oxidise higher order sugars and ethanol. this is used to produce 2-keto-L-Gluconic acid which is an intermediate of vitamin C. bacteria is called Gluconobacter oxydans

47
Q

How is streptomycin made?

A

synthesised by the bacteria streptomyces which is a gram-positive bacteria

48
Q

How is Swiss cheese made?

A

using propionic acid bacteria. Propionibacterium ferments lactate to form acetate, propionate and carbon dioxide

49
Q

What was the fist human protein to be commercially produced by bacteria?

A

humulin

50
Q

What is recombinant human insulin primarily produced in?

A

E.coli

51
Q

How does the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine work?

A

uses a harmless virus to carry some of the pathogen’s genetic material into cells to generate an immune response

52
Q

How does the Pfizer vaccine work?

A

uses mRNA technology in a lipid carrier which enters the host cell, instructing the host cell to translate the spike protein antigen

53
Q

What are problems with using bacteria?

A

prokaryotes won’t recognise eukaryotic promotors. bacterial genes don’t have introns. codon bias may require edits to the sequence. mammalian proteins require post-translation modifications which bacteria may not be able to do

54
Q

How do you produce metabolites?

A

a single gene will not suffice so you need to build a whole metabolic pathway which requires multiple genes and regulation of their expression

55
Q

How can you mine with microorganisms?

A

can use microbes to extract valuable metals form low grade orbs - process called microbial leaching

56
Q

What is gene mining?

A

isolating potentially useful genes without having to culture the organism

57
Q

How does targeted gene mining work?

A

need an enzyme capable of degrading a certain pollutant, find environment polluted with target compound, isolate and clone DNA from the environment, bacteria containing clone screened for growth on target compound, cell extract from potential suspects tested in vitro for the enzyme of interest

58
Q

What did Louis Pasteur do?

A

in 1851 he showed that alcoholic fermentation was the result of microbial activity

59
Q

What happened at Carlsberg brewery?

A

1883 - pure strain brewing

60
Q

What did Pfizer do in 1923?

A

set up the first citric acid production plant in Brooklyn using Aspergillus niger

61
Q

When and who was pencillin purified by?

A

1941 - Florey and Chain

62
Q

How can cortisone be made?

A

Rhizpous arrhizus is able to convert diosgenin to an intermediate which can then be converted to cortisone

63
Q

What can be used to treat asthma?

A

1-Ephedrine from a yeast species

64
Q

What has significant clinical use a vasoconstrictors?

A

ergot alkaloids from Claviceps

65
Q

Who first made lysergic acid?

A

Hofmann and Stoll

66
Q

What can control cholesterol levels?

A

statins

67
Q

What is itaconic acid used for?

A

to improve the properties of vinyl polymers, such as those used in emulsion paint - produced by Aspergillus niger

68
Q

What is gluconic acid used for?

A

toothpaste manufacture - Aspergillus niger

69
Q

What is glycerol produced by?

A

yeast

70
Q

What are the used of glycerol?

A

solvents, plasticisers, sweeteners, explosives, cosmetic soaps and anti-freeze

71
Q

What does gibberellic acid do?

A

growth promoting hormone

72
Q

What is the major cultivated mushroom?

A

Agaricus bisporus at 37%

73
Q

How is quorn grown?

A

on glucose from maize

74
Q

What are the annual sales of quorn?

A

£15 million in the Uk

75
Q

How is bread and beer produced?

A

yeast ferments glucose to yield ethyl alcohol and carbon dioxide

76
Q

What is used to make tempeh?

A

Rhizopus spp. from soy beans

77
Q

How is soy sauce made?

A

by fermenting a mixture of soybeans, wheat kernels, raw or roasted wheat flour with Aspergillus oryzae

78
Q

What can biological control be defined as?

A

the use of one organism to control another

79
Q

What is Biocon?

A

a soil-borne fungus which parasitises eggs and larvae if some nematodes which can cause significant damage to plant roots

80
Q

What is green muscle?

A

based on the spores of an insect fungus which can be sprayed or used as a spore powder

81
Q

What is bioremediation?

A

the use of living organisms or their products to metabolise or detoxify environmental pollutants

82
Q

What is mycofiltration?

A

the impregnation of fungal spores and hyphae into fabric landscaping cloth. the fungal mycelium acts as a filter, trapping and degrading contaminants

biological sciences year 1 (16 decks)

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