Cracking the Codes of Life - Movie

                                                     
CRACKING THE CODES OF LIFE.

Have you ever wondered where DNA is located in the world? DNA is everywhere. Well, more specifically, in every living organism. DNA are basic molecules that guides the creation of life. Some believe it comes from space- others, well, they believe it came on earth a long time ago. DNA is said to be in almost every cell in the body. But what is so special about DNA that other molecules on earth don't have? There it is! A lightbulb came right on top of my head! DNA can replicate itself! DNA separates to form two new molecules. The reason it replicates itself because it needs to reproduce- in order to do that, the cell must copy and paste it's genetic information. Our body is constantly replacing old, dead cells with new cells. For the cell division to occur, the DNA replication must also occur. To summarize, without the DNA replication, we wouldn't exist!!

So,  DNA isn't just three letters. There is much much more than that. There are four letters in DNA alphabet: G, C, T and A (Guanine, Cytosine, Thymine, and Adenine). Guanine and Cytosine always go together, and Thymine and Adenine always go together. These are called nucleotides. If even the smallest letter of DNA (from all the 3 billion letters there are) in the baby's body goes wrong, he/she can become sick. This rarely occurs- but mostly because of genetic conditions (Maybe the baby's parents or grandfather/grandmother was sick as well.)

In class, we drew a diagram of what DNA's cycle looks like. It is shown in the picture below.

As you can see, after DNA and GENE comes PROTEIN. Proteins are 3 - Dimensional, which is why we are as well. Think of tangles of ribbon = in any shape. The shape defines what it does and tells others what it does. A protein is our destiny, as Craig Venter says from "Cracking the Codes of Life".

We, as humans, have 20 different amino acids in our body. The human body only makes 12/20. This is why we need to have a lot of protein in our bodies. If we run out of Amino Acids, we wouldn't live. In order to life, at least 8 essential amino acids must be gained in our diet.

That is what I learned from the movie that we watched in class!