Do-It-Yourself Transgenic Fly Research

Let's say you want to measure the daily changes in a period gene, that is, one whose properties change over time. How would you go about doing that? By making a transgenic fly that glows with the period gene, duh! Actually, it took Ph.D. scientists a while to figure that one out, but now you can learn how to create your own glowing transgenic flies in the Virtual Transgenic Fly Lab from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. In this virtual lab you do every step yourself from preparing the DNA, to injecting it into fly embryos, to breeding your own glowing flies, and finally to measuring the light with a bioluminescene counter. (White lab coat not included.) This virtual lab isn't dumbed down like many science websites--which is just how we like it. It's a realistic, comprehensive, sophisticated, interactive multimedia lab that will leave you more knowledgeable about genetics and how genetics research is done.