You are unique

I used to harbour this secret ambition of becoming a geneticist one day. Doing all sorts of cutting-edge experiments and finding cures for cancer and AIDS……but then my mom was like saying “Where can find work wan?” and my hope was dashed. Nevermind, this door closed and another opened for me……..I have to say that I have always been fascinated with Biology and the aspect i find most interesting, besides the Darwin's evolution theory, is genetics.

How is it when 2 persons mate and you get offsprings that inherit certain characteristics from you and your partner.....the traits can be good (like how tall you going to be, hair colours and eyes) or the bad traits such as genetic diseases.

Colour blindness, haemophilia (blood cannot clot properly, resulting in serious bleeding), thalasemia (also a type of red blood cell disorder) are some of the common conditions passed down from generation to generation.....often afflicting male offsprings and the females ended up as carriers for the defective gene.

When I was still schooling, i used to tease my sister by telling her that she must have been adopted for knowing how to roll her tongue, while I can't. And my husband always nudge me to 'practise' rolling my tongue, thinking that it is some kind of skill that i could pick up with just a few tries. "Hey! it is either you can do it or you can't. It is in the genes" i retorted.

see link
http://www.le.ac.uk/ge/genie/vgec/sc/inheritance.html

However, family studies also demonstrate that tongue-rolling is not a simple genetic character as studies done on identical twins show that it can be influenced by both genetics and the environment.......so i guess you can try to practise and see whether you can indeed roll or twist your tongue....who knows?

You can also try this fun experiment on how genetics play a role in shaping the way you are (see link)

http://www.reachoutmichigan.org/funexperiments/agesubject/lessons/handouts/genetics.html