Drosophila Melanogaster

Introduction An organism that studied to better understand the biology of another organism is considered to be a model organism. There are several organisms used or model organisms used for humans, mice, frogs, roundworm, chicks, fish, and fruit flies. All of these organisms ate much smaller and easier to care for and observe. A major advantage to using these model organisms are their ability to rapidly develop off spring often times in much larger numbers than a human. Some organisms produce The fruit fly, drosophila melanogaster, is one of the smallest model organisms used to provide insight to the genetic development of humans. Development biologists won a Nobel Prize in 1995 for the genetic studies and later principles they discovered with fruit flies that also apply to humans and other animals (Zerucha 15). Fruit flies have an advantage that their life expectancy is an average of 39.5 days (Flatt 1986). The female having the ability to lie over 200 eggs in a lifetime provide multiple model organisms to observe (Appel 40). The size of fruit flies enables researchers to store them in cultured vials. This class has been divided into groups and prepared vials for each group. Our group has collectively chosen three fruits to determine if the fruit flies have a preference to a particular fruit. I predict that the fruit flies will prefer the rotting banana over the raspberry and orange. Along with this a prediction will choose the banana 2:1 over the other fruit was made by myself.
Methods and Materials: One scoop of culture was mixed dry with a pinch of yeast. Water was then added to the top of the media and allowed to sit undisturbed for five minutes.
Raspberry
Raspberry
Banana
Banana A piece of bruised banana will be placed in the center of one side of a food selection chamber. On the other side, a solid piece of raspberry will be placed in the center (Fig 1). Individually a fruit fly will be placed in the connecting tunnel
Fig. 1
Fig. 1 of the

Cited: Appel, Susan, and Lloyd Birmingham. Arthropods. Portland, ME.: J. Weston Walch, 1998. Print. Becher, Paul G., Marie Bengtsson, Bill S. Hansson, and Peter Witzgall. "Flying the Fly: Long-range Flight Behavior of Drosophila Melanogaster to Attractive Odors." Journal of Chemical Ecology 36.6 (2010): 599-607. Print. Flatt, Thomas, and Tadeusz J. Kawecki. "Juvenile Hormone As A Regulator Of The Trade-Off Between Reproduction And Life Span In." Evolution 61.8 (2007): 1980-991. Print. Zerucha, Ted. Human Development. Philadelphia: Chelsea House, 2004. Print.