A population is composed of members of the same species that simultaneously live and interact in the same area. When individuals in a population breed, they pass down their genes to their offspring. Many of these genes are polymorphic, meaning that they occur in multiple variants. Such variations of a gene are referred to as alleles. The collective set of all the alleles within a population is known as the gene pool.

Overview

Genetic engineering – the process of purposefully altering an organism’s DNA – has been used to create powerful research tools and model organisms, and has also seen many agricultural applications. However, in order to engineer traits to tackle complex agricultural problems such as stress tolerance, or to realize the promise of gene therapy for treating human diseases, further advances in the field are still needed. Important considerations include the safe and efficient...

Transgenesis, or the use of genetic engineering to alter gene expression, is widely used in the field of developmental biology. Scientists use a number of approaches to alter the function of genes to understand their roles in developmental processes. This includes replacement of a gene with a nonfunctional copy, or adding a visualizable tag to a gene that allows the resultant fusion protein to be tracked throughout development.
In this video, the viewers will learn about the principles behind...

In this video, we demonstrate genetic transformation of the rice genome using an Agrobacterium tumefaciens binary vector. This bacterium facilitates the transfer of a foreign DNA plasmid using Agrobacterium virulence...

In this interview, Jason Rasgon explains the concept of genetic drive and the characteristics of an effective gene drive system. The use of the endosymbiotic bacterium, Wolbachia pipientis, as a means to spread genes through mosquito populations, is...