From Fossils to Phylogenies includes four activities, each listed separately in the SMILE curriculum. The unifying theme of the activities is dinosaurs.
1) Bringing Back the Dinosaurs - A Case Study Activity - A case study on the ethics of cloning dinosaurs. This gives the students the ability to discuss and debate the ethics of scientific endeavors.
2) Mass Spectrometry Activity - Using analytical chemistry methods to analyze protein fragments from the fossil of a T-rex.
3) BLAST Activity - Using BLAST to determine which extant animal the T-rex is most closely related to.
4) Phylogenetic Tree Activity - Using MAB Phylogeny Analysis to generate a phylogenetic tree placing extinct animals, like the T-rex and Mastadon, among extant animals.
OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY
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