Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis:
A Genetic Analysis Using Online Bioinformatics Tools

A Lesson Plan By:
Jessica Taylor, Teacher, East High School, Denver, CO,
Rebecca M. Davidson, Bioinformatics Analyst, National Jewish Health, Denver, CO, and
Michael Strong, Assistant Professor, National Jewish Health and the University of Colorado, Denver, CO




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Lesson PDF

Background

Materials

Sequences

Questions

Part A

Part B

Part C

Part D

Part E

Websites

Clustal W

GeneMarkS

Copymasters



Overview

This lesson asks you to compare gene sequences between one wild-type and one of a variety of mutant Mycobacterium tuberculosis (TB) strains. You will identify mutations as single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and then make an inference on whether your variant strain will be resistant to a TB drug or not.

Objectives

By the end of this activity you will be able to:

1) identify and explain what a single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) is when comparing two gene sequences.

2) navigate online scientific tools to translate DNA into polypeptide sequences and to compare and contrast wild-type and variant polypeptide sequences.

3) determine whether your given SNP will result in ‘sense,’ ‘missense,’ or ‘nonsense’ in the resulting amino acid sequence.

4) hypothesize whether a SNP will likely cause antibiotic resistance.















Copyright © 2013 Michael Strong and Jessica Taylor