A Family Disease

• Author: WGBH Educational Foundation
• Subject: Science and Technology
• Institution Name: Teachers Domain
• Collection: WGBH Educational Foundation
• Grade Level: Primary, Secondary

• Abstract: This video segment from NOVA: "Cracking the Code of Life" explores the challenges and questions faced by women who have a strong family history of breast cancer, and who now have the option of being genetically tested for a disease that has no cure. Grades 9-12.

• Course Type: Learning Module
• Languages: English
• Material Types: Activities and Labs, Curriculum Standards
• Media Formats: Video
• Curriculum Standards: MCREL Compendium of K-12 Standards
  US.MCREL.K-12.sci.4
  Standard 4. Understands the principles of heredity and related concepts
  US.MCREL.9-12.sci.4.1
  1. Knows the chemical and structural properties of DNA and its role in specifying the characteristics of an organism (e.g., DNA is a large polymer formed from four kinds of subunits; genetic information is encoded in genes as a string of these subunits; each DNA molecule in a cell forms a single chromosome and is replicated by a templating mechanism)
  US.MCREL.9-12.sci.4.2
  2. Knows ways in which genes (segments of DNA molecules) may be altered and combined to create genetic variation within a species (e.g., recombination of genetic material; mutations; errors in copying genetic material during cell division)
  US.MCREL.9-12.sci.4.3
  3. Knows that new heritable characteristics can only result from new combinations of existing genes or from mutations of genes in an organism''s sex cells; other changes in an organism cannot be passed on
  US.MCREL.9-12.sci.4.4
  4. Knows that mutations and new gene combinations may have positive, negative, or no effects on the organism
  US.MCREL.9-12.sci.4.6
  6. Knows features of human genetics (e.g., most of the cells in a human contain two copies of each of 22 chromosomes; in addition, one pair of chromosomes determines sex [XX or XY]; transmission of genetic information to offspring occurs through egg and sperm cells that contain only one representative from each chromosome pair; dominant and recessive traits explain how variations that are hidden in one generation can be expressed in the next).

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