Contemporary Issues in Biology Online Course

Week 15, Chapter 12 -- Adopt-a-Species

Introduction

Suppose you work for a company that finds and commercializes novel uses for wild species. Your boss has approached you to begin a selective breeding program for your adopted endangered species. In this assignment, your job will be to write a report to your boss. Your report will include your evaluation of the commercial potential for the endangered or threatened species you "adopted" earlier this semester. You will also consider some ethical aspects of your proposed actions.

Part 1 -- Required components of the report

Begin with a complete classification of your species, including kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species. You can visit this site for help: http://www.natureserve.org/explorer/index.htm. Click on Search, then type in the common or scientific name of your species. (This may not work for all species; if your species isn’t there, try just a Google search on your species’ name.)
List three adaptations that your species has. Remember, adaptations “increase an organism’s fitness in a given environment” – in other words, they support an organism’s ability to attract mates, live long enough to reproduce, and/or provide for its offspring. Explain to your boss how each of the three adaptations you listed contributes to your species’ fitness.
Of the three adaptations you listed, choose one that could make your company some money if you could either enhance it or eliminate it by selective breeding. Explain to your boss why you have chosen that trait as a target for selective breeding. Here are some hints:
- Think of ways to commercially exploit a useful adaptation – as food for humans or other animals, as decorations or building materials, or as medication, fiber, dyes, or jewelry. Selective breeding may be able to enhance one of these useful traits – and there are probably more that are not listed here.
- Alternatively, you can think of ways your species is dangerous – perhaps it is venomous, poisonous, noxious, or ugly. Maybe it transmits disease or destroys buildings, clothing, crops, or wildlife habitat. Selective breeding may be able to eliminate one of these traits.
Explain to your boss the procedures you would follow to carry out your artificial selection experiments. Besides just the mechanics of the breeding experiment, also explain to your boss what you still need to learn (like the reproductive biology of your species) before you can begin.
As you are writing your report to your boss, you realize that your experiments could yield an entirely new species. Your boss doesn’t share your understanding of biology, so you’ll have to explain how new species arise. Outline a specific scenario by which your selection experiments could lead to reproductive isolation and the creation of a new species. (Note: if there is not a lot known about the reproductive biology of your species, you might have to make some assumptions).
Once you have written your plan, reflect on it. Do you think it is ethical to proceed? Make a recommendation to your boss, and explain your reasoning.

For full credit, your report must meet the following criteria:

Length: 500-750 words, not including references.
Spell-check and proofread your work.
You must include correctly cited links to all references you used.

Part 2 -- Post your report to your discussion board forum:

Post your documentary to your personal D2L Discussions forum, and click the "Save" button.

Because you're posting all your Adopt-a-Species assignments to the same forum, please include the words "Week 15" in the title of your post for this assignment. No matter what, always save a back-up copy of your assignment somewhere on your computer! Although you will save/post directly in D2L, you don't want to run the risk that it won't be there when you come back to access it.

View a sample assignment here

Part 3 -- Respond to at least two others:

Read the previous Adopt-a-Species assignments AND this week's assignments for two other students, as assigned in the D2L discussion board forum entitled "Adopt-a-Species: Response Grid" for this week. Add your comments to the posts of each student. Click on their name, then "add comment" to their specific post. If one or both of the students you are supposed to respond to have not posted an assignment by the deadline, you can respond to another student (or students) of your choice from our section of the class.

Please be sure you read ALL of the posts in your students' posts, not just this week's, so you can get a good background on the selected species. Make sure your response is substantive and constructive. This means that you have read and thought about the report and that, after some reflection, you are offering an additional perspective as you might in a good conversation. It is not enough to say simply "nice job", or "I liked that." The goal is to thoughtfully add something else interesting and new related to the content of the original post. At a minimum this should be at least 50 words, and 50-100 is preferable. Check out this page for more on the topic of good and bad responses.

After you have responded to two other students, complete the gradebook declaration for this week's Adopt-a-Species assignment in D2L Declarations. (Your gradebook declaration is subject to the Honor Code.) You will self-report your responses to other students' posts, but I will grade your entry myself, according to the rubric posted below.

Here is the text of the Desire2Learn Gradebook Declaration:

(2 points) I have responded constructively to the posts of at least two other students (1 point for each response).

Grading rubric for Week 15, Chapter 12 Adopt-a-Species assignment:

I will use the following rubric to grade your Adopt-a-Species assignments. Notice that the rubric does not heavily reward creativity; I am much more interested in looking for evidence that you fulfill the assignment criteria.

	Standards
Criteria	Full Credit	Half Credit	No Credit
Uses same species adopted in Week 6	Yes = 1 point		No = 0 points
Includes complete classification of adopted species	Complete = 1 point	Partial = 0.5 point	Absent = 0 points
Describes adaptation #1	Complete explanation of how adaptation increases fitness = 1 point	Partial explanation of how adaptation increases fitness = 0.5 point	Absent = 0 points
Describes adaptation #2	Complete explanation of how adaptation increases fitness = 1 point	Partial explanation of how adaptation increases fitness = 0.5 point	Absent = 0 points
Describes adaptation #3	Complete explanation of how adaptation increases fitness = 1 point	Partial explanation of how adaptation increases fitness = 0.5 point	Absent = 0 points
Chooses commercially viable adaptation as target for selective breeding and explains rationale for choosing adaptation	Complete explanation = 1 point	Partial explanation = 0.5 point	Absent = 0 points
Explains procedure for selective breeding	Complete explanation = 2 points	Partial explanation = 1 point	Absent = 0 points
Mentions at least one thing that you'd need to learn before beginning	Yes = 1 point		No = 0 points
Describes how selective breeding can lead to a new species	Complete, plausible explanation = 2 points	Explanation is incomplete or implausible = 1 point	Absent = 0 points
Explains whether it is ethical to proceed	Complete explanation = 1 point	Partial explanation = 0.5 point	Absent = 0 points
All references cited correctly, including author, title, date, functioning hyperlink, and download date	Yes, without exception = 1 point	Yes, but not always = 0.5 point	No = 0 points

Please note that points will be deducted as follows if you fail to meet the "mechanical" requirements of the assignment:

0.5 point will be subtracted for every 2 spelling/grammatical errors (for helpful hints, click here);
1 point will be subtracted if your post is too short.

Contemporary Issues in Biology -- BIOL 1003
Mariëlle H. Hoefnagels, Ph.D. © 2004-2015.
biology1003 at OU dot edu (at = @, dot =.)
Last Updated August 5, 2014 11:02 PM

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