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September 20, 2005
Harry Potter and The Recessive Gene
Most people are familiar with J.K. Rowling's stories about the young wizard Harry Potter and the latest book "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" only serves to further prove itself as a cultural phenomenon. In fact, I've just finished reading it and even thru 6 book iterations and 3 movies, I still want more. Anything Harry Potter and I will be happy. Somehow the stars all lined up and the bright full moon this past weekend smiled bright on my wishes and an article surfaced across my computer screen. Scientists (real legit ones) have written theories about how wizarding ability may be genetic. They believe using the Harry Potter franchise would be a great way to get children interested in genetic concepts by using analogies to a story so endearing and close to their hearts.
Wizards or witches can be of any race, and may be the offspring of a wizard and a witch - the offspring of two muggles (muggle-born), or of mixed ancestry (half-blood).
This suggest that wizarding ability is inherited in a mendelian fashion, with the wizard allele (W) being recessive to the muggle allele (M). According to this hypothesis, all wizards and witches therefore have two copies of the wizard allele (WW). Harry's friend's Ron Weasley and Neville Longbottom and his arch-enemy Draco Malfoy are pure-blood wizards: WW with WW ancestors for generations back. Harry's friend Hermione is a powerful muggle-born with (WW with WM parents). Their classmate Seamus is a half-blood wizard, the son of a witch and a muggle (WW with one WW and one WM parent). Harry (WW with WW parents) is not considered a pure-blood, as his mother was muggle-born.
Just like in real genetics, there are even scientists who dispute this theory and offer their own. They hope with the use of these examples, the concepts of mendelian genetics can be introduced to children as young as five, and then built on by gradually introducing specific terms such as "gene" and "allele", and relating these to chromosomes and DNA. At every stage, children's familiarity with the Harry Potter characters can be used as a hook to engage them in discussing concepts of heredity and genetics.
Damn, I only wish science would have taken a similar approach to teaching me the foundations of genetics back when I was schooling. It would have been so much more fun that staring at half-assed drawings of DNA chains and mitochondria in textbooks.
Posted by tranism at 11:27 PM | Permalink