Analysis Of Matt Ridley´s Chromosome 11: Personality

665 Words3 Pages

Matt Ridley, Author of Genome made understanding human genetic material and the method behind its mechanics easy to understand. With real life examples and situations related to how each of our chromosomes design and affect our existence. Genome offers insight to the very nature of our very beginning, with follow through to the end of our life. Meanwhile explaining how, through our genes we can live forever. In Chromosome 11 titled Personality, I found it fascinating to learn that our cholesterol plays a role in our disposition. Cholesterol plays a big role because there was found to be a correlation between it and serotonin. During an experiment where mice were fed low cholesterol diets, they became more aggressive and bad tempered. The cause seemed to be a drop in serotonin levels. (pg.170) Dopamine and Serotonin are both …show more content…

The product TEP1 is protein, which forms part of the most unusual little biochemical machine called Telomerase. (pg. 196) Telomerase are a sequence of TTAGGG’s known as telomere that protects the duplicating DNA. Telomere starts off as long lines of a series of jumbled words at the beginning and end of your DNA. It allows replication of DNA without losing any pieces of the important information it carries. The telomere allows the DNA to take its place as it duplicates so the DNA does not get lost. Simultaneously as the DNA takes its place, the telomere will disappear and become shorter As the Telomere gets shorter, life will also become shorter. On the other hand long telomeres will produce long living individuals. It was said these telomeres were closely related to the idea of ageing; however it was found by one expert that there are 7,000 age-influencing genes in one human genome. (pg. 204) The protective telomere have raised the question, is a genome immortal? It does seem possible that it could be immortal but in reality there really is no

More about Analysis Of Matt Ridley´s Chromosome 11: Personality