Exam 12: Biotechnology and Synthetic Biology

Scientists produced a synthetic bacterium in 2010, but no one has yet produced an entire cell from scratch. How did the synthetic bacterium from 2010 compare with an entirely de novo cell, and what could be reasons that scientists might want to accomplish the latter?

Green fluorescent protein (GFP) is used for detecting translational activity of a fused protein, whereas lacZ reporters are used to detect transcriptional activity of a fused gene.

Engineering a metabolic pathway enables a researcher to use different genes from unrelated organisms.

Describe the three main steps to clone a gene into an organism.

Developing vaccines for humans relies heavily on manipulating and engineering vectors.

It is possible to rapidly screen for mutations in regulatory genes using

The principle underlying how salmon were genetically engineered to grow faster is the

Which of the following is NOT an example of synthetic biology?

If a foreign gene is cloned into an expression host, it is important that the host itself

One problem with both BACs and YACs is that genetic regions of these chromosomes cannot be subcloned.

Create an experiment where you would use both a Southern blot and a Northern blot to determine if a newly isolated bacterium contains and actively uses the same catabolic pathway as previously demonstrated. What is the value in doing the Southern blot first? With results from these experiments, how would you conclude if the same pathway is active or not?

What molecular mechanism/feature does site-directed mutagenesis exploit to introduce a mutation at a specific site?

Explain how eukaryotic genes can be used to produce proteins in a bacterial host. What steps are required?

Which of the following is NOT a common step in molecular cloning using plasmids?

Expression vectors are designed to ensure that ________ can be efficiently ________.

Describe a method developed by molecular biologists to easily observe the success of a genetic engineering procedure involving the ligating of a gene of interest into a plasmid.

Which of the following terms is used to describe a synthetic DNA fragment?

Cloning vectors can be distinguished from expression vectors by

If a protein that could be toxic to the expression host needs to be expressed in large quantities, then it is best to select an expression vector that

Describe three characteristics of an ideal cloning host for genetic engineering.