Blog #10 Why is dissection an important part of a biology curriculum? Which animals and/or plants should be included in biological studies?

Blog #10 Why is dissection an important part of a biology curriculum? Which animals and/or plants should be included in biological studies?

Anatomization is another word for dissection; thus, dissection is the process of disassebling and observing something to determine its internal structure and it helps as an aid to discerning the functions and relationships of its components. Dissection is an important part of a biology curriculum because it is a sort of model for humans to use it on. For example, mice or rats are used for experiments to determine if something could work on the rats in order to work for humans.

A rat could be tested on something before used on humans. Such as a type of medicine or surgery to make sure it is used safety to be performed on humans. Even though dissection may look unpleasant and nasty, that is one way to experiment what does and doesn't work for humans.

In the short story- Flowers for Algeron, it is first tested on the rat Algernon to make sure if it works on a human. The surgery was to be make a person/animal smarter by doing the surgery on their brain. After experimenting it, it really worked on the rat; therefore, they started surgery on the person to make him smarter. A few weeks later, he was really really smart but then the rat had some problems. Later on, the rat died! To see what happened during the experiment and not continue with this type of surgery, the scientists had to cut the rat open to see why it died and didn't stay alive.

Some other animals such as frog are dissected at school in the course Biology to show students how it is inside a body like the tissue or the stomach, etc. Maybe some other animals can be use in dissection can be birds or even worms. However, I also don't think birds would work because their habitat is different from ours and humans don't have wings.

Blog #9 Define the different forms of community interaction: competition, commensalism, mutualism, predation, parasitism Give an example and a picture for each

Blog #9 Define the different forms of community interaction: competition, commensalism, mutualism, predation, parasitism Give an example and a picture for each 

Parasitism is a type of symbolic relationship between two species of plants or animals in which one benefits at the expense of the other and even sometimes, without killing it. In addition, one organism lives on or inside another organism and harms it. The host from the parasite that gets all or part of its nutrientional needs from the other organisms.An example of parasitism is a tick feeds ont he blood of its host and may carry certain diseases that might cause microoraganims to appear.

Predation is an interaction in which one organism captures and feeds on another organism. The predator is an organism that does all the killing and eating work. The prey is a food organism. Like in the picture, lions are fierce animals and they are strong; therefore, you can see that they are even eating an ox for food. Even cheetahs aren't animals to hunt for lions, instead, it is vice versa where cheetahs hunt for lions because cheetahs are fast and they have sharp teeth and claws to catch animals easier. Their powerful legs also causes them to run faster after their prey or enemy.

Mutualism causes both species to benefit from the relantionship. The biggest example is flowers. As shown in the picture, a bee pollunates the flower causing the flower to sprout and look beautiful; thus both species are happy of the ending. The flowers also provides the bee nectar as a source or food or pollen and the bee helps the flower to reproduce.

In commensalism, one member of the association benefits and the other is neither helped no harmed. For instance, barnacles are small marine animals that often attach themselves to the whale's skin. Whales are not harmed from barnacles when they are sticked  onto the whale's skin and yet the barnacles benefit from the whale's constant moving in the ocean. Another example is that if a bird makes a nest on a tree, the tree does not get affected in any way and yet the birds benefit from the tree by having a place to set their shelter on which is their nest.

Last of all, competition occurs everywhere. To be specific, competitions take place when organisms of the same or different species attempt to use an ecological resource in the same place at the same time. Resource is defined as to any neccessar of life such as water, nutrients, light, food, or space. An example would be that birds that are stronger would be able to fight for food better especially in the sky like an eagle catching a jay bird. The eagle would win; therefore, also getting food to eat and fill up its stomach.