Genetics - your own personal code

Deep inside the nuclei that are found in most of the cells of your body is a long strand of a molecule that is the chemical blueprint for your entire physical form. While external influences may affect what parts of this code are read, or may even change the code, this code is still copied every cellular generation. When these copies, found in discrete units called chromosomes, are expressed, they tell a tale of you - blue eyes, brown hair, PTC taster, tongue roller, lactose intolerant you...

The study of genetics is where we are now - we are looking at how the specific traits that collectively comprise you are inherited and expressed. The traits that you inherit come as a split set - half from your mom and half from your dad, divided from their own original code by a process called Meiosis, which results in the formation of gametes or sex cells. In the male, these cells containing only half of the chromosomes of a body cell will be carried by the sperm. In the female, the mother's half of the chromosome pool is laying, waiting, inside a round, expectant egg. Once fertilization occurs, it is only a short matter of time before the two sets of DNA are recombined, homologous pairs joining up to once again create a new living being. There are many ways to make a baby, but the code is still entirely new each time. Variation is the spice of life.

From simple Mendellian genetics or royal sex linked traits to complex incompletely dominant trihybrid crosses and epistatic inhibitors, you are gonna become genetic pros. This is cool stuff, and the power of probability becomes very real. Forget those poker cards and dice - this is the ultimate game of chance!