Genetics

Presented by Natalie Moroz, Steph Guerra, and Sharon Hung GMOs have been making headlines recently, but what exactly is a genetically modified organism? This lecture will start by covering GMOs in the laboratory – how they’re made and how that…

In today’s busy world, it can be hard to find time to exercise. Various factors, such as sedentary jobs and the presence of TV and video games at home, can contribute to inactivity in adults and kids alike. Both fitness experts and medical professionals…

Whether we realize it or not, humans, like all organisms, are genetically programmed to reproduce, but today we have many more reproductive choices than our ancestors. Birth control, for example, prevents procreation by those who might otherwise have…

Two decades ago, on the recommendation of acclaimed astrophysicist Carl Sagan, NASA adopted a definition of life simply stating, “Life is a self-sustained chemical system capable of undergoing Darwinian evolution.” [1] While this definition is certainly…

Our brain contains billions of cells called neurons, each connected to one another in a complex network, permitting us to think, move, and assimilate information about our environment. While many cells in our body can talk to one another, neurons are…

Presented by Kevin Bonham Single-celled microorganisms are everywhere, and are intimately linked to many aspects of our life. Some can cause disease, others decompose our waste, and many even help us digest our food – there are 10 times more bacteria…

Presented by Clare Malone Is there a biological reason why some people become violent offenders? This is an area of biology with many legal, ethical, and societal implications. Tonight we will focus on what the biology can, and cannot, tell us about the…

Scientists can study stress by observing people who suffer from it. What are the physiological changes these people undergo, if any? Is their appetite normal? And what about the heart rate? Lots of observations are possible, meaning there a lot of ways…

-- Have you ever considered that your body is its own ecosystem? Our bodies are host to countless microbial organisms, which live in and on every conceivable part of our body and outnumber our human cells ten to one. We depend on these microbes for a…

-- To unearth the secrets of our human origins, scientists are delving deep into the prehistoric record to find the last common ancestor of great apes and humans, while simultaneously looking in more recent history to define when and where modern humans…