Corn Domestication

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INTRODUCTION Our article title is “The Origin of the Naked Grains of Maize” which introduces the research performed to explain one aspect of the large variation between maize and Mexican teosinte from which maize was domesticated. The paper goes into how maize has evolved from teosinte and the genetic experimentation performed in order to demonstrate that maize evolved from teosinte. This is an interesting research topic because both of their genotypes are so similar yet their phenotypes are so dramatically different that it resulted in a question of whether maize did in fact evolve directly from teosinte and are members of the same species (Zea Mays) or if it is just a completely different species. Plant Morphology: In order to fully understand the research done in the article, one must be familiar with general plant morphology. Plant morphology basically means the structure of the plant and in our case, the form of corn plants. First off, all plants consist of three different parts: roots, stems and leaves. However, it should be remembered that even though all plants may consist of these three parts, this does not mean that the stems, leaves, and roots of each plant will look the same as the next. Therefore, this should also be noted when viewing Zea Mays plants as well; not all corn plants are going to look the same. We can show this by comparing the physical differences of maize and teosinte. Modern maize presents itself with a single primary shoot which is a stem with all of its leaves, whereas teosinte presents itself with many lateral branches that have their own sets of leaves attached to them. Another major difference is that Teosinte’s fruit (the individual kernels) is enclosed within a stony... ... middle of paper ... ...ersity Genetics Department. 2 Aug 2004. Rutgers University. 29 Oct 2006. HKA_Documentation.htm> Renart J, Reiser J, Stark GR. "Transfer of proteins from gels to diazobenzyloxymethyl-paper and detection with antisera: a method for studying antibody specificity and antigen structure", Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 1979 Jul;76(7):3116-20. “Selective sweep”. Wikipedia. 2006. 13 November 2006. Towbin H, Staehelin T, Gordon J. "Electrophoretic transfer of proteins from polyacrylamide gels to nitrocellulose sheets: procedure and some applications" Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 1979 Sep;76(9):4350-4. Wang, Nussbaum-Wagler, Li, Zhao, Vigouroux, Faller, Bomblies, Lukens & Doebley. “The Origin of the naked grains of maize.” Nature. Vol. 436. 4 August 2005. 714-719.

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