Compiled
by: Agnes Gwyneth Gutierrez (Allosyndesis)
In an earlier edition of Genews, we asked BS Biology students from different
majors the following question: "Why
is genetics important to your major field?", in order to know how genetics
serves as a key element in understanding other life sciences and how it links with other major fields like
Microbiology, Zoology, Wildlife, Ecology, Cell and Molecular Biology, Plant
Biology, and Systematics.
Now, we seek to broaden the horizon in which
genetics is considered essential by asking students from different degree
programs who are currently taking Bio 30 the following question:
GENEWS Team: “How
is genetics important to you and your degree program?”
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“Genetics allows
for us agricultural biotechnologists to understand the crops we grow and the
animals we raise to better feed the growing population of the world. Advances
in the study of genetics enable us to engineer products that people need,
produce more with less, and hopefully, reach food security.”
-
“Genetics
answered a lot of questions for me. “Why am I like this?”, “Why do I seem
different?”, and a lot more. It helped me understand myself on a molecular
level, and since then, I was able to appreciate and love myself. By studying genetics,
I’ve learned that every organism has a unique chromosome structure. It explains
the functions and roles of genes. From the molecular level, it helped me
understand organisms in the macro level as well – which is what Biology is
about. From the molecular to the macro level, we are able to comprehend life.”
- Drew Kyla Baysa, Batch 2018, BS Biology
“Genetics
has helped me fully grasp the basics I need for my nutrition majors. This
course will help me as I continue my nutrition studies: the importance of
knowing the similarities and differences between humans in order to develop a
well-balanced diet. Furthermore, this course has helped me to be able to
explore the benefits of genetic engineering for the enhancement of the
nutritional intake of a patient.”
- Allen Gabor, Batch 2019, BS Nutrition
“Nutrition
deals with humans and the metabolic pathways that occur inside a human's body.
In order to fully understand the process of these pathways, we must first learn
the small details like studying the genes responsible for certain traits.
Learning genetics will help us in explaining and analyzing the steps in each
process, and how they affect the individual and the community the individual
belongs to.”
- Ayra Catapang, Batch 2019, BS Nutrition
“It
helps us understand why there are variations among us. How certain diseases,
conditions, or traits are inherited by the infants from their parents. Genetics
is very essential, especially in my course, because it is a prerequisite for
other subjects, and a great branch of science that will be helpful for my
future when I'm in med school.”
- Jay Harold Odon, Batch 2019, BS Nutrition
“Genetics is
important to me, personally, because it has helped me understand how my parents
were able to pass on their traits to me. It also helped me understand the
presence of different conditions among certain individuals. It is also
important in my degree program, BS Nutrition, because each and everyone's diet
is influenced by a lot of factors and one of them is their genes. Hence, studying genetics for my degree program is truly important.”
- Ann Jullian Mendoza, Batch 2019, BS Nutrition
“Me, being a
statistics student, genetics may seem not really connected [to my degree program]. But as everyone says,
math is a language of science. The idea of genetics cannot be fully understood
without statistics. For instance, during the discussion in the lab we had a
question on the formula of getting the CC (crossing-over coincidence). Being a
statistics major, I observed that there is an overlapping event occurring at DCO (double cross-over) which is used in the formula to get SCO (single cross-over) I and II. That formula looks very
similar to conditional probability. And actually it was! The distances we
computed in linkage maps are not discrete numbers of distance but more likely
the chance that is logically represented as distance. It was great to observe a
connection between statistics and genetics as I enjoy both subjects.”
“Genetics is
important to me since I acquire more knowledge about life and understand my
health even more. Genetics is also important to my chosen degree program, which
is BS Statistics, because I could come up with data statistics about human
beings that can be a vital study not only for me, but also for everyone.”
- Aubrey Aseron, Batch 2019, BS Statistics
“I was taught
that genetics is the most interesting and fascinating in the field of Biology.
Also, it can explain many things. Genetics is important to me since it can
explain where I came from and how am I different to others. Understanding
genetics can help me detect genetic disorders which can help and improve the
quality of life of the sufferer. Statistics is a cornerstone for research, and
researches are vital to our growth and development as human beings and as
occupants of the earth. This can be said for countless of areas including
agriculture, economy, health, medicine, and much more. Studying the statistics
behind genetic mutation and lethal genes are just [a few examples as to why genetics
is important] to my chosen degree program that would help humanity become aware
of the existence of such cases, and further serve as a medium of prevention,
which, ultimately, can serve my purpose in my chosen degree program.
“Statistics also
work hand in hand in one of sub-field of genetics which is Statistical Genetics,
a scientific field concerned with the development of statistical methods for
drawing inferences from genetic data. Outcomes in this field help people
generate theories that can help in explaining evolution and how the
composition changes over time.”
- Wilmar Mangapot, Batch 2019, BS Statistics
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The
study of genetics is not limited to Biology and its group of sciences, but is
also useful in other related fields. While genetics can be considered as an
important branch of Biology, its scope does not end here. As there are many
concepts that are helpful in understanding genetics, from chemistry to statistics,
so does the opposite hold true, wherein other fields can be understood better
with the help of genetics.
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