QUANTITY OF DNA.........

[muffy]

hi!!

do the birds have less DNA than the mammals ??

tks!!!

[MrMistery]

Lol... How would you define less or more DNA? By the number of base pairs?
It really depends on the bird and the mamal you are comparing

[muffy]

it was a T/F question of my exam.....

[MrMistery]

False

[victor]

Ok..this is a new lesson that I got...the more complex of the organism's structure, the more DNA kbp that they got.
Just compare between virus and E.coli in the DNA base pairs where virus has 180-360 kbp and E.coli has 4636 kbp.
PS: kbp = kilobase pavis (we count DNA in x1000)

[Chris4]

@victor - Like everything in science it is often not that simple. One comparison is never enough. Its like doing an experiment once.

Amoeba has 670,000,000,000 base pairs. thats 670 billion. Humans have 3 billion.
http://www.genomenewsnetwork.org/articl ... omes.shtml

As explained here http://www.abc.net.au/science/slab/geno ... ndings.htm. Its not how big it is, its how you use it (Where have i heard that before )

A bird does only have about 1 billion bps so it does have less than us.

[MrMistery]

So are you guys saying this should be labeled true?
It seems to me that it depends on what bird and what mamal you are comparing....

[Chris4]

where have you read that birds have more dna than mammals? I think you have to compare number of base pairs aswell as number of genes.
Also which mammal? there are many

[MrMistery]

That's what i am saying...
There is no way to tell absolutely..
Some birds have more DNA than some mamals and other birds have less DNA than other mamals

[Chris4]

And therefore shouldn't have been asked as an exam question.

[victor]

Just take the general one between majority and minority...but, after reading your statements, I agree that it shouldn't be an exam question..

[MrMistery]

You shouldn't take the general example since the DNA size is not known for every mammal and bird. What you should do is consider cause and effect. I think this was more of an evolution question than a genetics one. The professor wanted to know if you understand evolution. The wrong answer is "Mammals are more evolved, so i say true". In my opinion, it is Ok as an exam question