Conceptual Tool Kit

Question 1

T or F: four developmental processes are neither independent of each other nor strictly sequential (what are the four developmental processes?)

Answer 1

TRUE

Remember PFM CDG (pattern formation, morphogenesis, cell differentiation, and growth)

Question 2

Proteins that make cells different from one another ( ___1.___ )

Answer 2

1. tissue-specific proteins

Question 3

___1.___ nucleic acid hybridization to detect the ___2.___ that is being transcribed from a gene

Answer 3

1. In situ

2. mRNA

Question 4

How many genes out of the total genome are developmental genes?

Answer 4

Likely to be in the thousands

Question 5

___1.___ : genetic information is not lost during differentiation

Answer 5

1. genetic equivalence

Question 6

___1.___ : differences in gene activity generate differences between cells

Answer 6

1. differential gene expression

Question 7

T or F: genes are active participants compared with the proteins they encode that determine cell behavior and direct the course of development

Answer 7

FALSE (are passive participants)

Question 8

___1.___ : what a group of cells will normally develop into (fate map)

Answer 8

1. fate

Question 9

___1.___ : a stable change in the internal state of a cell

This involves a change in the genes that are expressed by the cell, and this change fixes or restricts the cell’s fate

Answer 9

1. determination

Question 10

___1.___ : once a cell is determined, the stable change is inherited by its descendants

Answer 10

1. lineage

Question 11

What is a regulative system?

Answer 11

embryos where the development potential of cells is much greater than that indicated by their normal fate

Question 12

What is a mosaic system?

Answer 12

(think Weismann) embryos where, from a very early stage, the cells can develop only according to their early fate (cytoplasmic determinants get distributed in a regular fashion into different cells during cleavage, thus determining the fate of that cell lineage at an early stage)

Question 13

T or F: no purely mosaic embryos are known to exist!

Answer 13

TRUE

Question 14

The difference between a regulative and mosaic system reflects the relative importance of…

Answer 14

…cell-cell interactions in each system!

Question 15

___1.___ : cell-autonomous or non-cell autonomous (whether or not the effects of a given gene being expressed are restricted purely to the expressing cell)

Answer 15

1. genetic effects

Question 16

It is important that the responding cell is able to respond to the inducing signal ( ___1.___ )

Answer 16

1. competence

Question 17

___1.___ can generate spacing patterns

Answer 17

1. lateral inhibition

Question 18

Development is consistent and reliable

Development needs to be reliable in the face of fluctuations that occur either within the ___1.___ or in the ___2.___

How does it achieve in a robust manner?

Answer 18

1. embryo
2. external environment

answers to question:

1. redundancy (two or more ways of carrying out a particular process)
2. negative feedback

Question 19

Changes in development due to changes in the genes are fundamental to ___1.___

Answer 19

1. evolution

Question 20

___1.___ : permissive (when a cell makes only one kind of response to a signal) or instructive (when cells respond differently to different concentrations of the signal)

Answer 20

1. induction