Research into Population Genetics

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Unit 7
Research into Population Genetics
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Stage 1 Warming-up Activities
Stage 2 Reading-Centred Activities
Stage 3 After-Reading Activities
Stage 4 Listening-and-Speaking Practice
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Warming-up Activities

• Group work
• Questions for thought and discussion
• Background information
• Enriching your vocabulary
• Comparing the following words

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Group work

• Go over the preview, the pre-reading questions
  and the title of the text before listening to the
  summary of the story and anticipate what we are
  going to read.

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Questions for thought and discussion

• Listen to a short passage carefully and then
  answer the following questions .

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Background information

• Luca Cavalli-Sforza Cavalli-Sforza, born in
  Genoa, Italy, was educated at the University of
  Pavia where he gained his MD in 1944. After
  working on bacterial genetics at Cambridge
  (1948-1950) and Milan (1950-1957) he has held
  chairs in genetics at Parma (1958-1962) and Pavia
  (1962-1970). In 1970 he was appointed professor
  of genetics at the University of Stanford,
  California, a position he held until his
  retirement in 1992.

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• Cavalli-Sforza has specialized mainly in the
  genetics of human populations, producing with
  Walter Bodmer a comprehensive survey of the
  subject in their Genetics, Evolution and Man
  (1976). He has also done much to show how genetic
  data from present human racial groups could be
  used to reconstruct their past separations. This
  reconstruction, based on the analysis of 58
  genes, yields a bifurcated evolutionary tree with
  Caucasian and African races in one branch and
  Orientals, Oceanians, and Amerinds in the other.

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• Columbus Christopher Columbus, an Italian-born
  master navigator (born in Genoa, Italy in 1451
  and died at Valladolid, Spain in 1506) who sailed
  in the service of Spain, is commonly described as
  the discoverer of the New World America. His
  four transatlantic voyages (1492-1493, 1493-1496,
  1498-1500, and 1502-1504) opened the way for
  European exploration, exploitation, and
  colonization of the Americas.

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• Columbus's real greatness lies in the fact that
  having found the West Indies making major
  errors in his navigational computations and
  location in doing so he was able to find his
  way back to Europe and return to the Indies. It
  is as the result of Columbus's discovery that
  the New World became part of the European world.

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• human genetic map Our bodies are comprised of
  trillions of microscopic units called cells.
  Cells in turn are built up from many specific
  types of molecules, both large and small. The
  large molecules or macromolecules include
  polysaccharides, nucleic acids and proteins.
  Proteins are the workhorses of our cells. There
  are about 40,000 different types of proteins in
  our bodies. Each protein is present in many, many
  copies. An adult, for example, carries about 1021
  (a billion trillion) hemoglobin molecules.

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• The flow of genetic information is from DNA to
  RNA to Protein. Each protein is a linear polymer
  of a specific sequence of 20 different amino
  acids. DNA is also a linear polymer comprised of
  4 types of nucleotides. The sequence of amino
  acids in each protein is encoded by a segment of
  DNA called a gene. Three consecutive nucleotides
  in a gene encode a single amino acid in the
  corresponding protein. The genetic code is
  universal among all living things.

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• Khoisan Khoisan is the name by which the lighter
  skinned indigenous peoples of southern Africa,
  the Khoi (Hottentots) and the San (Bushmen) are
  known. These people were the earliest inhabitants
  of Africa and dominated the sub-continent for
  millennia before the appearance of the Nguni and
  other black peoples. There were probably about
  120,000 living in South Africa around 1500.

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• Basques The Basques are a people who live in a
  small region (about the size of Rhode Island in
  the United States) that straddles the border of
  Spain and France from the sea in the west into
  the Pyrenees in the east. This area is called
  Euskal Herria (comprising seven provinces,
  historically Araba, Bizkaia, Gipuzkoa, and
  Navarra on the Spanish side Laburdi, Zuberoa,
  and Behe-Nafarroa on the French side). There are
  about 660,000, according to the 1991 census.
  Fewer than 80,000 of these are on the French side
  of the frontier which runs through the Basque
  Country, the rest on the Spanish side. Basques
  speak a language called euskara,

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• but today only about 25 of the population is
  fluent in that tongue. Even so, the word for a
  Basque person, euskaldun, means possessor of the
  Basque language. The Basque population is
  distinguished physically by a high incidence of
  Rh Negative factor in the blood. No one knows
  exactly where the Basques came from. Some say
  they have lived in that area since Cro-Magnon man
  first roamed Europe. Estimates of how long they
  have lived there vary from 10,000 to 75,000
  years. Some say they are descended from the
  original Iberians. More fanciful theories exist,
  as well. One is that the Basques are the
  descendents of the survivors of Atlantis.

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Enriching your vocabulary

• Read the sentences carefully and guess the
  meaning of the italicized term in each sentence
  according to the context and your own
  experiences.

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• There is a feeling of our own superiority and our
  pride that lie at the root of our response to
  them.
• We have argued that the broadcasting was biased
  towards the right wing and the government of
  today.
• To date, research on the application of the
  genetic map is very limited.

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• It was not possible to change direction suddenly,
  yet the damage to education was obvious as
  campuses sometimes resembled market-places rather
  than institutions of higher learning.  
• What she saw was the face of a stranger who
  resembled her mouth pulled out of shape, skin
  white, hair without color.
• Pauls features bore a strong resemblance to his
  fathers.
• The London of the 1990s bears little resemblance
  to the London of my youth.

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• What was needed was nothing less than a new
  industrial revolution and a thriving market.
• Youre nothing less than a murderer!
• The setting up of this plant in three months is
  nothing less than a miracle.
• The present trend is nothing less than alarming.

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• His remarks should have served as an
  encouragement to the authorities to develop this
  important aspect of community care.
• Criticism and debate are to be welcomed and
  should not be confined to academic circles.
• As of today, we do not believe that the
  declaration of an emergency state would increase
  the flow of supplies.

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• In effect, the influence of this government was
  going down gradually.
• Only when your approach to good health can be
  adapted to all your own requirements, will you
  really succeed in obtaining your goals of health
  care.
• The new treatment can be used either alone or in
  combination with the traditional one.

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• In addition, the research is expected to shed
  more light on the social consequences of cities
  changing economic roles.
• Wherever they are now, black people are descended
  from Africans.

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Homework

• Learn the new words and expressions of the text
  by heart.
• Go over the text and try to get the main idea of
  the text.
• Analyze the structure of the text.

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Reading-Centred Activities

• 1. Global Reading Task
• Reading Skills
• Text structure analysis
• 2. Detailed Reading Task
• Language points
• Simulated writing
• Summary of the text

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After-Reading Activities

• Vocabulary Exercises
• Translating and Writing

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Listening and speaking activities

• Talking about the topic or retelling the text
• Listening and speaking practice in XP center