Genomics For Dummies

What does it mean to sequence a DNA? And how do we do this? 👩‍🔬

Sequencing DNA simply means examining DNA, and determining the exact order of the components (i.e.: nucleotide bases – A, T, C, & G) in a strand of DNA. So when we sequence a human genome, we find out the exact sequence of someone’s unique 3 billion letters of DNA. here’s a snippet of what that…
How do mRNA vaccines work? 💉

Now that we know what proteins do and how they’re made, we can get into the good stuff! Let’s do a little something different today, and talk about how mRNA vaccines work. And a little recap about the science before we start: mRNA vaccines are a relatively new technology. The concept has been studied for…
What exactly do proteins do? 🧪

(It’s been a minute – life ran away from me!) 🏃‍♀️💨 Last month, we spoke about what genes do (recap: they encode proteins), and their crucial role in protein production. But what exactly do we need proteins for? Well, just about everything, it turns out. Proteins are large complex molecules made up of polypeptide (i.e.:…
What exactly do genes do? 🧬

In the last post, we learned that genes are specific segments of DNA, and that DNA bases that ‘encode’ genes are called ‘coding’ DNA. Genes (i.e.: a defined combination of bases) contain instructions that tell your cells to make specific proteins. These proteins are responsible for different functions in the body (e.g.: protein antibodies in…
What is DNA? And how does it relate to genes? 🧬

DNA is a molecule made up of two linked strands that wind around each other, to resemble a twisted ladder in a helix-like shape. That’s why DNA is described as a “double helix”. Each DNA strand is made up of a backbone and a string of letters, called ‘nucleotide bases’. There are four possible bases:…
What exactly is Genomics? And how is it different from Genetics? 🧬

Genomics is the study of all the genes in our DNA (i.e.: the genome – including the non-coding sequences*), their functions, their interactions with each other and the environment, and their influence on the human body. The study of genomics also involves studying DNA sequencing techniques, such as Sanger sequencing and Next Generation Sequencing (NGS).…