Hello everyone, Fae the geneticist in training here. I want to introduce you to Drosophila Melanogaster. This critter is also known as the fruit fly. Drosophila is a good organism to use as an animal model.
I am undertaking a genetics course at University as part of this course I need to conduct experiments in the laboratory. The image you see is from an experiment where I was given two tubes of Drosophila. The first tube had progeny (babies) of both sexes in it. I had to pick 5 males out of this tube. The second tube had female progeny I had to pick 5 of these too. You may be wondering how I did that. Well, I had to euthanise them (put them to sleep) this was a tedious process. I then put the Drosophila into another tube and laid the tube on its side so they could wake up. Of course, the idea is for the Drosophila to mate. I hope that I managed to pair them successfully.
In this experiment, the male drosophila had white eyes and curly wings. Whereas the females were wildtypes. In genetics "wildtype" means normal. For Drosophila wildtypes have red eyes with straight wings.