Building DNA Structure with Candies
Let's find out together how the cells in the tongue are different from those in the nose
Department Supervisor: Santina Cutrupi.
Target Audience: Primary and secondary schools students.
Duration: 2h
Description
Let's play with sweets and build the structure of DNA! Let's gently discover what DNA looks like and how it works. The cells in our body all have the same DNA sequence. They are all the same in terms of the bricks, the nucleotides, found in the long DNA molecule. Yet they have a different shape and capacity from each other.
In the nose, there are cells that allow us to smell, while in the tongue there are cells that allow us to taste the food we eat. How is it possible to have so many different types of cells from the same molecule?
The bricks of DNA, the nucleotides, are about three billion, forming a sequence about two metres long. The DNA is enclosed in the nucleus of each cell thanks to the compact structure due to nucleosomes. The DNA wraps around a ‘ball’ of protein, the nucleosome, and all these balls are arranged so that they all remain close together in the nucleus. Nucleosomes have a structural function and their organisation allows the DNA to be compacted in the nucleus, but also tells the cells which parts of the DNA each cell type needs.
Cells in the nose can distinguish smells and those in the tongue can distinguish tastes. This is possible thanks to modifications on the tails of the nucleosomes, parts of the proteins that function as flags for the parts of the DNA that each cell uses to produce all the components it needs to carry out its activities.
Objectives
The activity aims to show how cells work: from DNA to the activities they are capable of performing. Each cell specialises in a function and all together the cells of the body enable us to eat, play and have fun: observation and comparison of different cell types.
Periods of availability for the activity: school year 2023/2024, upon reservation.
The activities are also included and can be booked in the 2023-24 ‘Crescere in Città’ of ITER - Turin Education for Responsible Education Catalogue.