Genes are material entities that parents pass to offspring during
reproduction. These entities encode information essential for the
construction and regulation of polypeptides, proteins and other
molecules that determines the growth and functioning of the organism.
The word "gene" is shared by many disciplines, including classical
genetics, molecular genetics, evolutionary biology and population
genetics. Because each discipline models the biology of life
differently, the material entity that supports the gene in one
discipline is not the same as in the other. Following the discovery
that DNA is the genetic material, and with the growth of
biotechnology and the project to sequence the human genome, the
common usage of the word "gene" has increasingly reflected its
meaning in molecular biology. In the molecular-biological sense,
genes are the segments of DNA which cells transcribe into RNAs and
translate, at least in part, into proteins.
Read the rest of this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene
Today's selected anniversaries:
1864 Calcutta, India was almost completely destroyed by a
cyclone which had killed 60,000 people.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calcutta)
1877 After battling U.S. armed forces for more than three
months, retreating over 1,000 miles across Oregon,
Washington, Idaho, and Montana, Chief Joseph and his Nez
Perce band finally surrendered following a five-day siege.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_Joseph)
1908 Prince Ferdinand became Tsar when the autonomous
principality of Bulgaria proclaimed independence from the
Ottoman Empire.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_of_Bulgaria)
1969 The first episode of 'Monty Python's Flying Circus' was
broadcast on BBC1.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Python%27s_Flying_Circus)
1970 Terrorists of the 'Front de Lib�ration du Qu�bec'
kidnapped a British diplomat, sparking the October Crisis
in Montr�al, Canada.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_de_Lib%E9ration_du_Qu%E9bec)
Wikiquote of the day:
"As for myself, I always willingly acknowledge my own self as the
principal cause of every good and of every evil which may befall
me; therefore I have always found myself capable of being my own
pupil, and ready to love my teacher." ~ Giacomo Casanova
(
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Giacomo_Casanova)