DNA Extraction Lab: Strawberry – Background: The long, thick fibers of DNA store the information for the functioning of the chemistry of life. DNA is present in every cell of plants and animals. The DNA found in strawberry cells can be extracted using common, everyday materials.
Strawberries are soft and easy to pulverize. Strawberries have large genomes; they are octoploid, which means they have eight of each type of chromosome in each cell. Thus, strawberries are an exceptional fruit to use in DNA extraction labs and strawberries yield more DNA than any other fruit (i.e. banana, kiwi, etc.).
We will use an extraction buffer containing salt, to break up protein chains that bind around the nucleic acids, and dish soap which helps to dissolve the phospholipid bilayers of the cell membrane and organelles. This extraction buffer will help provide us access to the DNA inside the cells.
- heavy duty quart ziploc bag
- Strawberry
- Table salt
- Shampoo (look for sodium lauryl sulfate as a first ingredient)
- Water
- Cheesecloth or similar loose woven fabric
- Funnel
- 50mL vial / test tube or similar container
- 500 mL beaker or mason jar
- glass rod, popsicle stick, wooden skewer or toothpick
- chilled (refrigerated or briefly frozen) isopropyl alcohol
Warning: Isopropyl alcohol is a skin irritant, and inhaling or consuming it can make you sick. Use in a well ventilated space. Alcohols are also flammable and the vapors can ignite. Keep away from open flame. Procedure:
- Gather all materials.
- Prepare the DNA extraction buffer.
In 500 mL beaker add
- 400mL (1 ¾ cups) water
- 50mL (3 Tablespoons + 1 teaspoon) shampoo
- 5mL (2 teaspoons) table salt
Slowly invert the bottle to mix the extraction buffer.
- Place one strawberry in a Ziploc bag.
- Smash/grind up the strawberry using your fist and fingers for 2 minutes. Careful not to break the bag!
Why? The physical smashing breaks the plant’s cell walls and allows the cytoplasm to leak out.
- Add 10mL (2 teaspoons) of extraction buffer (salt and soap solution) to the bag.
- Kneed/mush the strawberry in the bag again for 1 minute.
Why the detergent? The soap breaks down the lipids (fats) in the phospholipid bi-layers of the cell membrane and nuclear membrane. This releases the contents from the cell and the chromosomes containing DNA from the nucleus.
- Assemble your filtration apparatus as shown to the right.
- Pour the strawberry slurry into the filtration apparatus and let it drip directly into your test tube.
Why? Filtering strains all the large cellular junk out of the mix. The DNA, still tightly wound, is so small it slips through with the liquid and into the test tube. Caution! From this stage onward, you must be careful not to agitate the mixture.
Gently Slowly pour 20mL (1 Tablespoon + 1 teaspoon) cold alcohol down the inside wall of the test tube to form a separate, clear layer on top of the cloudy strawberry mixture below (You should see small wisps of gel-like material forming above the boundary.) OBSERVE
Why? The polar/non-polar boundary layer causes the DNA to precipitate. The tiny bits of wispy junk floating in the alcohol just above the boundary layer is DNA.
- Dip the glass rod or wooden stick into the tube where the strawberry extract and alcohol layers come into contact with each other. OBSERVE
- If the procedure worked really well (it often doesn’t) you will get long strands of DNA forming, sometimes more than an inch long! Using the bamboo skewer or toothpick, gently wind up the precipitated DNA.
- As you gently lift the skewer or toothpick out of the container after winding, it will carry long strands of a mucus-like substance that looks like “boogers.” That’s concentrated DNA, just like they do it on CSI 😉
If it didn’t work perfectly, don’t despair. Most people see the wispy stuff, but you have to get a bit lucky to get the long strands to form References and Resources: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/squishy-science-extract-dna-from-smashed-strawberries/ https://science.wonderhowto.com/how-to/extract-dna-from-strawberry-with-basic-kitchen-items-0140302/ https://www.stevespanglerscience.com/lab/experiments/strawberry-dna/ Video: https://youtu.be/vPGKv53zSRQ Video: https://youtu.be/usaE_XZx-a8
Contents
- 1 Is strawberry unicellular or multicellular?
- 2 Is strawberry DNA diploid?
- 3 What genes do strawberries have?
- 4 What is the DNA of a strawberry made of?
- 5 Is there DNA in all fruits?
- 6 What does strawberry DNA look like?
- 7 Are fruits made of plant cells?
Are strawberries made of cells?
DNA: Extract it! Dear Garrett, You know, your question reminds me of a couple other science questions from curious readers. Evangeline, age 7, wants to know why her hair is black. Sureya, age 8, wants to know why some people have curly hair. It just so happens that one of my favorite science projects explores our questions about what makes us unique.
It has to do with our DNA, or the blueprint for life. Not too long ago, some of my friends at Washington State University showed me how to extract DNA—from a strawberry. You can try it at home, too. You’ll need simple ingredients, including dish soap, meat tenderizer, rubbing alcohol, and strawberries.
Just like humans, strawberries and other plant life are made up of cells. Inside cells, you’ll find their DNA. Your DNA contains the instructions for your eye color, hair color, and if that hair is straight or curly. These traits can be passed down through generations.
- A strawberry’s DNA also holds information about the fruit’s color, size, and shape, and that it has seeds growing on the outside.
- When we extract DNA from a strawberry, we have to bust through a few parts of the cell to get to the DNA.
- We start out mashing up the strawberries with a little water and pouring the smoothie-like liquid into a test tube.
Then we add a little dish soap to help dissolve a layer around the DNA called a membrane. Next, we add a bit of meat tenderizer to break up proteins that help hold different parts of the DNA together. But the DNA can’t separate from the rest of the ingredients without one final step.
- Add some cold rubbing alcohol to the mix and it will pull DNA up to the top of your test tube.
- When you try this out, ask yourself—does it look a bit like a booger floating in your tube? If so, you’ll know you’ve got the strands of DNA.
- While living things carry around DNA in their cells all the time, it’s not every day people actually get to see it up close.
That’s what my friends and I like most about showing people how to extract it. If you want to turn this project into an actual experiment, you’ll need to test an idea or question about the extraction, too. What happens when you add more or less of an ingredient? Can you extract DNA from all vegetables and fruits? I’m sure you can think up even more questions to test out.
Drop a strawberry into a clear glass or plastic cup or jar.
Use a blender or spoon to smash up the fruit. If you put the fruit in a baggie, smash it up inside the baggie. This breaks up the plant cells.
In a separate cup, mix together about 1/2 cup of water, a teaspoon of dish soap, a dash of meat tenderizer and a teaspoon of salt.
Add the liquid mixture to the smashed fruit. Smash them together to further break up the plant cells. Try to avoid making a lot of soap bubbles.
Place a coffee filter inside a clear cup or jar. Pour the fruit mixture into a coffee filter. Twist the coffee filter to force the liquid into the cup.
Take ice-cold rubbing alcohol and carefully pour it down the side of the cup or jar. Do not stir or mix! You should use about as much alcohol as you have fruit liquid. You’ve just extracted DNA from the fruit.
Within a few seconds, you should see a white, cloudy substance floating to the top of the liquid in your cup or jar. That’s the DNA!
Use a cotton swab or wooden stick to pick up strands of DNA.
: DNA: Extract it!
What structure do strawberry cells have?
Answer and Explanation: The DNA structure of a strawberry is double helical. This is the universal structure of DNA.
Do strawberries have eukaryotic cells?
Answer and Explanation: A bacterium is a prokaryotic organism, a strawberry cell is a eukaryotic plant cell, and a human cheek cell is a eukaryotic mammalian cell.
What type of cells are fruit made of?
Apple fruit flesh or cortex comprises of homogeneous parenchyma-type cells.
How many cells does strawberry have?
The average number of cells per mature fruit was 0.72 × 10 6, 1.96 × 10 6, and 2.94 x 10 6 for ‘Tillikum’, ‘Tristar’, and ‘Selva’, respectively.
Is strawberry unicellular or multicellular?
ONLY multicellular, autotrophic (photosynthetic) Phylum Anthophyta are flowering, seed producing plants. They are a very diverse group and include organisms such as strawberry plants, palm trees, and water lilies.
How is a strawberry cell different from a human cell?
Each cell in a strawberry contains 8 copies of its genetic information (octoploid), while human cells only contain 2 copies (diploid). The DNA being visualized in this lab is clumps of many copies of DNA from many different cells throughout the strawberries.
Do strawberry plants have DNA?
Enhancing Variety Development with DNA Markers – In general, the use of conventional breeding approaches to combine many important traits in a single variety is difficult. To make the conventional breeding process more precise and efficient, many crop breeders use DNA technologies to help guide crossing and selection of the best seedlings.
Below we describe how the UF/IFAS strawberry breeding program uses these types of technologies to produce better berries. The UF/IFAS strawberry breeding program has identified certain DNA sequences present at thousands of points along the chromosomes of cultivated strawberry. These DNA sequences can be thought of as the physical addresses of specific chromosome locations, and some will be close by or even inside certain genes of interest.
Today, powerful technologies allow the detection of chromosome regions that contain genes controlling a trait. Specific to strawberry, these traits can include disease resistance, fruit quality attributes such as sugar content or aroma, or any other trait that naturally occurs in cultivated strawberry. Figure 1. Associating traits with chromosome regions in cultivated strawberry using DNA sequencing and FlexQTL™ software. Researchers in the UF/IFAS strawberry breeding program use the natural DNA information from strawberries to tag many important traits for disease resistance and fruit quality.
FaFAD1: gene controlling peach-like flavor in strawberry. In order to pinpoint the chromosome locations of traits, three things are needed: (1) DNA marker data, (2) observational data on the traits that are carefully measured in the field or lab, and (3) specialized software that can analyze the marker data and the trait data together.
At UF/IFAS, we use next-generation DNA sequencing and advanced software called FlexQTL™ that has the ability to trace genes from new seedlings to their parents, grandparents, and beyond through pedigrees. Pedigree-based analysis has already been used to identify several chromosome regions behind resistance to diseases, such as angular leaf spot caused by the bacterium Xanthomonas fragariae (Roach et al.2016) and resistance to Phytophthora crown rot caused by Phytophthora cactorum (Mangandi et al.2017).
These diseases destroy plants in commercial strawberry production in Florida every year, and genetic resistance is the best way to combat them. An example of a fruit quality trait for which the chromosome regions is known is an aroma compound that gives a “fruity” scent to the strawberry (Chambers et al.2014).
Discovering the chromosome regions behind naturally occurring traits is the first step in using DNA information in conventional strawberry breeding.
Are fruit cells eukaryotic or prokaryotic?
Animal cells and plant cells are eukaryotic. Both of them contain a true nucleus and membrane-bound organelles such as mitochondria, vacuole, Golgi bodies, lysosomes, endoplasmic reticulum, etc.
Are plant cells prokaryotic or eukaryotic?
Animals, plants, fungi, and protists are all eukaryotes —eu means true—and are made up of eukaryotic cells.
Is strawberry DNA diploid?
Uncovering the origins of the cultivated strawberry Until now, little has been known about the evolutionary origins of the cultivated garden strawberry. Whereas most species, including humans, are diploid with two copies of the genome – one copy from each parent – strawberry is an octoploid, with eight complete copies of the genome that were contributed by multiple, distinct parental species.
In a new study published in Nature Genetics, researchers now unveil how the strawberry became an octoploid, as well as the genetics that determine important fruit quality traits. What researchers uncovered is a complex evolutionary history that started long ago on opposite sides of the world. “For the first time, analysis of the genome enabled us to identify all four extant relatives of the diploid species that sequentially hybridized to create the octoploid strawberry,” said Patrick Edger, MSU assistant professor of horticulture and co-author on the paper.
“It’s a rich history that spans the globe, ultimately culminating in the fruit so many enjoy today.” These four diploid species are native to Europe, Asia and North America, but the wild octoploids are almost exclusively distributed across the Americas.
The results presented in the paper suggest a series of intermediate polyploids, tetraploid and hexaploid that formed in Asia, prior to the octoploid event that occurred in North America, involving the hexaploid and a diploid species endemic to Canada and the United States. This makes the strawberry relatively unique as one of only three high-value fruit crops native to the continent.
Breeders began propagating these octoploids around 300 years ago. Since then, they have been used around the world to further enhance variety development. However, Edger hypothesized that — as with several other polyploids — an unbalanced expression of traits contributed by each diploid parental species, called subgenome dominance, would likely also be present in the octoploid strawberry.
- He was right.
- We uncovered that one of the parental species in the octoploid is largely controlling fruit quality and disease resistance traits,” Edger said.
- Nowing this, as well having identified the genes controlling various target traits, will be helpful in guiding and accelerating future breeding efforts in this important fruit crop.” The genomic discoveries provided by this study will advance the trait selection process, bringing about a more precise method of breeding for this important worldwide crop.
The genome will enable studies that were previously unthinkable in strawberry, and will be a catalyst for tackling difficult breeding and genetics questions. “Without the genome we were flying blind,” said Steven Knapp, UC-Davis plant scientist and study co-author.
- I remember the first time I saw a visualization of the assembled genome, which went from a complex jumble of DNA molecules of 170 billion nucleotides to an organized and ordered string of 830 million base pairs.
- That was a special moment that changed everything for us in strawberry.” Knapp said that, historically, scientists studying complex biological phenomena in strawberry have tended to focus on diploid relatives because of the complexity of the octoploid, even though genetic analyses in the octoploid are actually straightforward once one has a good road map.
“We have been on a crusade to shift the focus in the basic research community to the commercially important octoploid,” Knapp said. “The wild octoploid ancestors, together with cultivated strawberry, provide a wellspring of natural genetic diversity to support biological and agricultural research.” Traditional breeding has been highly successful in strawberry, yielding outstanding modern cultivars that have been the catalyst for expanding production worldwide.
- As with other crops, many challenges remain that will require breeders to continually redesign cultivars and introduce genes from wild species and other exotic sources to meet new challenges.
- The genome is an essential vehicle for applying predictive, genome-informed approaches in strawberry breeding and cultivar development.
For the U.S., improved varieties could provide a boon to an already-thriving business. The U.S. is the global leader in strawberry production, a yield comprising roughly one-third of the world’s total. In 2016, the country produced more than 1.5 million tons.
The sequencing and analysis of the cultivated strawberry genome, exposing a wealth of new information about its origin and traits, is the product of an international team supported by MSU AgBioResearch, UC Davis, the United States Department of Agriculture, the California Strawberry Commission and the National Science Foundation.
(Note for media: Please include a link to the original paper in online coverage: ) : Uncovering the origins of the cultivated strawberry
What type of DNA do strawberries have?
DNA Extraction Lab: Strawberry – Background: The long, thick fibers of DNA store the information for the functioning of the chemistry of life. DNA is present in every cell of plants and animals. The DNA found in strawberry cells can be extracted using common, everyday materials.
Strawberries are soft and easy to pulverize. Strawberries have large genomes; they are octoploid, which means they have eight of each type of chromosome in each cell. Thus, strawberries are an exceptional fruit to use in DNA extraction labs and strawberries yield more DNA than any other fruit (i.e. banana, kiwi, etc.).
We will use an extraction buffer containing salt, to break up protein chains that bind around the nucleic acids, and dish soap which helps to dissolve the phospholipid bilayers of the cell membrane and organelles. This extraction buffer will help provide us access to the DNA inside the cells.
- heavy duty quart ziploc bag
- Strawberry
- Table salt
- Shampoo (look for sodium lauryl sulfate as a first ingredient)
- Water
- Cheesecloth or similar loose woven fabric
- Funnel
- 50mL vial / test tube or similar container
- 500 mL beaker or mason jar
- glass rod, popsicle stick, wooden skewer or toothpick
- chilled (refrigerated or briefly frozen) isopropyl alcohol
Warning: Isopropyl alcohol is a skin irritant, and inhaling or consuming it can make you sick. Use in a well ventilated space. Alcohols are also flammable and the vapors can ignite. Keep away from open flame. Procedure:
- Gather all materials.
- Prepare the DNA extraction buffer.
In 500 mL beaker add
- 400mL (1 ¾ cups) water
- 50mL (3 Tablespoons + 1 teaspoon) shampoo
- 5mL (2 teaspoons) table salt
Slowly invert the bottle to mix the extraction buffer.
- Place one strawberry in a Ziploc bag.
- Smash/grind up the strawberry using your fist and fingers for 2 minutes. Careful not to break the bag!
Why? The physical smashing breaks the plant’s cell walls and allows the cytoplasm to leak out.
- Add 10mL (2 teaspoons) of extraction buffer (salt and soap solution) to the bag.
- Kneed/mush the strawberry in the bag again for 1 minute.
Why the detergent? The soap breaks down the lipids (fats) in the phospholipid bi-layers of the cell membrane and nuclear membrane. This releases the contents from the cell and the chromosomes containing DNA from the nucleus.
- Assemble your filtration apparatus as shown to the right.
- Pour the strawberry slurry into the filtration apparatus and let it drip directly into your test tube.
Why? Filtering strains all the large cellular junk out of the mix. The DNA, still tightly wound, is so small it slips through with the liquid and into the test tube. Caution! From this stage onward, you must be careful not to agitate the mixture.
Gently Slowly pour 20mL (1 Tablespoon + 1 teaspoon) cold alcohol down the inside wall of the test tube to form a separate, clear layer on top of the cloudy strawberry mixture below (You should see small wisps of gel-like material forming above the boundary.) OBSERVE
Why? The polar/non-polar boundary layer causes the DNA to precipitate. The tiny bits of wispy junk floating in the alcohol just above the boundary layer is DNA.
- Dip the glass rod or wooden stick into the tube where the strawberry extract and alcohol layers come into contact with each other. OBSERVE
- If the procedure worked really well (it often doesn’t) you will get long strands of DNA forming, sometimes more than an inch long! Using the bamboo skewer or toothpick, gently wind up the precipitated DNA.
- As you gently lift the skewer or toothpick out of the container after winding, it will carry long strands of a mucus-like substance that looks like “boogers.” That’s concentrated DNA, just like they do it on CSI 😉
If it didn’t work perfectly, don’t despair. Most people see the wispy stuff, but you have to get a bit lucky to get the long strands to form References and Resources: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/squishy-science-extract-dna-from-smashed-strawberries/ https://science.wonderhowto.com/how-to/extract-dna-from-strawberry-with-basic-kitchen-items-0140302/ https://www.stevespanglerscience.com/lab/experiments/strawberry-dna/ Video: https://youtu.be/vPGKv53zSRQ Video: https://youtu.be/usaE_XZx-a8
What genes do strawberries have?
Unwinding the past – While the modern strawberry’s chromosome collection is genomically complex, its fundamental genome is one of the simplest among crop plants. The strawberry of commerce is octoploid (2 n = 8× = 56; seven chromosome sets and eight chromosomes per set, 56 total), meaning that each cell contains remnants of four separate ancestral diploid subgenomes that underlie strawberry’s form and function.
- Examination of the origins of these four subgenomic complements began early in the 20th century, with study of meiotic pairing 9, 10, suggesting that an ancestor of the extant diploid species F.
- Vesca was a contributor to the octoploid genome.
- Small hints of the identity of other subgenome donors came from genetic analyses and various reconstructions 11, 12, along with some molecular 13 and cytological 14 data that provided critical clues.
Several of these avenues suggested that an ancestor of F. iinumae was at least one of the other subgenome donors. As pointed out by Edger et al.15, the genome is an allopolyploid, arising from multiple rounds of gametic nonreductions and cross pollination events.
Today the resulting subgenomes continue to behave as separate blueprints interpreted simultaneously to define the assembly and function of a common complex structure. The multiple-blueprint problem has hampered simple genetic analyses, as if a locus was mapped in a diploid genome, it may reside in any, or all, of the subgenomes that comprise the modern octoploid strawberry.
To make matters worse, strawberry is highly heterozygous, making it difficult to distinguish between homoeologous and paralogous gene copies. The recently published “Camarosa” sequence strengthened the evidence identifying the other genomic constituents in commercial strawberry.
The work agrees with earlier findings that F. iinumae and F. vesca are closest descendants to two of the four subgenome donors. But there is great diversity within F. vesca, a species that covers the northern hemisphere. The authors were able to narrow down the subspecies to F. bracheata, consistent with other findings that suggest this genotype contributed the maternal genome 16,
The authors identified genome sequence most closely resembling modern day F. nipponica, implying that ancestors of this species (that were sympatric with F. iinumae in Japan) gave rise to proximal tetraploid genotypes in neighboring China. The analysis also identified sequence most resembling the Eurasian genotype F.
What is the DNA of a strawberry made of?
Background information – Cells are the functional and structural unit for life in both plants and animals. There are pretty obvious differences between the two, but also many similarities. Both have many of the same organelles, including a nucleus, which is the control for the cell.
The nucleus contains DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid. In both plants and animals, the DNA is in the same shape – the famous double helix – that resembles a spiral staircase. DNA molecules in plant cells and animal cells are made from the same four chemical building blocks: adenine, cytosine, guanine and thymine.
The way the nucleotides are arranged and the information they encode determines whether the organism will grow fur, scales, leaves or skin. : Strawberry DNA – Museum of Science and Industry
Do fruits have DNA or RNA?
All living organisms are made up of cells that have DNA as the hereditary material. Even fruit! This activity will demonstrate how DNA can be isolated from multiple fruits using household items.
Is there DNA in all fruits?
How does the DNA extraction work? – the science bit – By chopping and mashing up the kiwi fruit, then leaving it in the salt and detergent mix, we break open the cell walls, called membranes, This lets all the cell contents out, including the DNA. But the DNA is still surrounded by polymers called proteins, DNA is found within the chromosomes inside the nucleus of the cells that make up every living thing, including your kiwi fruit. To extract this DNA, we have to separate it from all the other cell parts. This picture illustrates a cross-section through a cell – the DNA we want to extract can be found in the nucleus, at the very heart of the cell.
- The green kiwi paste now contains your freed DNA, but also has all the other cell stuff that you have released.
- Passing it through a sieve removes most of these unwanted bits.
- Then, when you pour the methylated spirits on top, the DNA turns into a solid, because it can’t stay dissolved in the methylated spirits.
You might get bubbles in between the purple and green layers. This is because of the different temperatures of the two layers. It makes the air dissolved in the green layer come out as bubbles! This experiment relies on an enzyme in the kiwi fruit to unlock the DNA.
Can DNA be found in fruit?
However, kiwi, mango and strawberry have been found to yield the most DNA.4. Cut a small piece of fruit, peel any tough skin and take out large seeds. Cut into small pieces.
How close is our DNA to a strawberry?
You may be surprised to learn that 60 percent of the DNA present in strawberries is also present in humans.
What does strawberry DNA look like?
Squishy Science: Extract DNA from Smashed Strawberries A genetically geared activity from Science Buddies Advertisement Key concepts DNA Genome Genes Extraction Laboratory techniques Introduction Have you ever wondered how scientists extract DNA from an organism? All living organisms have DNA, which is short for deoxyribonucleic acid; it is basically the blueprint for everything that happens inside an organism’s cells.
- Overall, DNA tells an organism how to develop and function, and is so important that this complex compound is found in virtually every one of its cells.
- In this activity you’ll make your own DNA extraction kit from household chemicals and use it to separate DNA from strawberries.
- Background Whether you’re a human, rat, tomato or bacterium, each of your cells will have DNA inside of it (with some rare exceptions, such as mature red blood cells in humans).
Each cell has an entire copy of the same set of instructions, and this set is called the genome. Scientists study DNA for many reasons: They can figure out how the instructions stored in DNA help your body to function properly. They can use DNA to make new medicines or genetically modify crops to be resistant to insects.
They can solve who is a suspect of a crime, and can even use ancient DNA to reconstruct evolutionary histories! To get the DNA from a cell, scientists typically rely on one of many DNA extraction kits available from biotechnology companies. During a DNA extraction, a detergent will cause the cell to pop open, or lyse, so that the DNA is released into solution.
Then alcohol added to the solution causes the DNA to precipitate out. In this activity, strawberries will be used because each strawberry cell has eight copies of the genome, giving them a lot of DNA per cell. (Most organisms only have one genome copy per cell.) Materials
Rubbing alcohol Measuring cup Measuring spoons Salt Water Dishwashing liquid (for hand-washing dishes) Glass or small bowl Cheesecloth Funnel Tall drinking glass Three strawberries Resealable plastic sandwich bag Small glass jar (such as a spice or baby food jar) Bamboo skewer, available at most grocery stores. (If you use a baby food or short spice jar, you could substitute a toothpick for the skewer.)
Preparation
Chill the rubbing alcohol in the freezer. (You’ll need it later.) Mix one half teaspoon of salt, one third cup of water and one tablespoon of dishwashing liquid in a glass or small bowl. Set the mixture aside. This is your extraction liquid. Why do you think there is detergent in the extraction liquid? Completely line the funnel with cheesecloth. Insert the funnel tube into the tall drinking glass (not the glass with the extraction liquid in it). Remove and discard the green tops from the strawberries.
Procedure
Put the strawberries into a resealable plastic sandwich bag and push out all of the extra air. Seal the bag tightly. With your fingers, squeeze and smash the strawberries for two minutes. How do the smashed strawberries look? Add three tablespoons of the extraction liquid you prepared to the strawberries in the bag. Push out all of the extra air and reseal the bag. How do you think the detergent and salt will affect the strawberry cells? Squeeze the strawberry mixture with your fingers for one minute. How do the smashed strawberries look now? Pour the strawberry mixture from the bag into the funnel. Let it drip through the cheesecloth and into the tall glass until there is very little liquid left in the funnel (only wet pulp remains). How does the filtered strawberry liquid look? Pour the filtered strawberry liquid from the tall glass into the small glass jar so that the jar is one quarter full. Measure out one half cup of cold rubbing alcohol. Tilt the jar and very slowly pour the alcohol down its side. Pour until the alcohol has formed approximately a one-inch-deep layer on top of the strawberry liquid. You may not need all of the one half cup of alcohol to form the one-inch layer. Do not let the strawberry liquid and alcohol mix. Study the mixture inside of the jar. The strawberry DNA will appear as gooey clear/white stringy stuff. Do you see anything in the jar that might be strawberry DNA? If so, where in the jar is it? Dip the bamboo skewer into the jar where the strawberry liquid and alcohol layers meet and then pull up the skewer. Did you see anything stick to the skewer that might be DNA? Can you spool any DNA onto the skewer? Extra: You can try using this DNA extraction activity on lots of other things. Grab some oatmeal or kiwis from the kitchen and try it again! Which foods give you the most DNA? Extra: If you have access to a milligram scale (called a balance), you can measure how much DNA you get (called a yield). Just weigh your clean bamboo skewer and then weigh the skewer again after you have used it to fish out as much DNA as you could from your strawberry DNA extraction. Subtract the initial weight of the skewer from its weight with the DNA to get your final yield of DNA. What was the weight of your DNA yield? Extra: Try to tweak different variables in this activity to see how you could change your strawberry DNA yield. For example, you could try starting with different amounts of strawberries, using different detergents or different DNA sources (such as oatmeal or kiwis). Which conditions give you the best DNA yield?
Observations and results Were you able to see DNA in the small jar when you added the cold rubbing alcohol? Was the DNA mostly in the layer with the alcohol and between the layers of alcohol and strawberry liquid? When you added the salt and detergent mixture to the smashed strawberries, the detergent helped lyse (pop open) the strawberry cells, releasing the DNA into solution, whereas the salt helped create an environment where the different DNA strands could gather and clump, making it easier for you to see them.
(When you added the salt and detergent mixture, you probably mostly just saw more bubbles form in the bag because of the detergent.) After you added the cold rubbing alcohol to the filtered strawberry liquid, the alcohol should have precipitated the DNA out of the liquid while the rest of the liquid remained in solution.
You should have seen the white/clear gooey DNA strands in the alcohol layer as well as between the two layers. A single strand of DNA is extremely tiny, too tiny to see with the naked eye, but because the DNA clumped in this activity you were able to see just how much of it three strawberries have when all of their octoploid cells are combined! (“Octoploid” means they have eight genomes.) More to explore from the Tech Museum of Innovation, Stanford School of Medicine, from the Tech Museum of Innovation, Stanford School of Medicine from Learn Genetics, the University of Utah, from Science Buddies This activity brought to you in partnership with Discover world-changing science. 
: Squishy Science: Extract DNA from Smashed Strawberries
Why do strawberry cells need DNA?
Strawberries need DNA because DNA makes up the fruit. The DNA directs all the cells activities and what to do. The DNA also gives coded directions for the strawberry to create proteins. So without the DNA the strawberry cells would not know what to do and how to create its own proteins.
Are fruits made of living cells?
For some organisms the truth of this theory may be hard to recognize. For example, various fruits and vegetables by themselves sitting in the grocery store do not seem to be alive. Yet they are alive. They grow, they use oxygen, and perform many of the other processes associated with life.
What are strawberries made of?
The Strawberry: A Multiple Fruit When we think of fruits and vegetables, we’re pretty sure about which is which. We tend to lump sweet or sour-tasting plants together as fruits, and those plants that are not sugary we consider vegetables. To be more accurate, however, we must consider which part of the plant we are eating.
While vegetables are defined as plants cultivated for their edible parts, the botanical term “fruit” is more specific. It is a mature, thickened ovary or ovaries of a seed-bearing plant, together with accessory parts such as fleshy layers of tissue or “pulp.” Thus, many of the foods we think of casually as fruits, such as rhubarb (of which we eat the leaf stalks), are not fruits at all, and many of our favorite “vegetables” actually fit the definition of fruit, such as the tomato.
As a subcategory of fruits, berries are yet another story. A berry is an indehiscent (not splitting apart at maturity) fruit derived from a single ovary and having the whole wall fleshy. Berries are not all tiny, and they’re not all sweet. Surprisingly, eggplants, tomatoes and avocados are botanically classified as berries.
- And the popular strawberry is not a berry at all.
- Botanists call the strawberry a “false fruit,” a pseudocarp.
- A strawberry is actually a multiple fruit which consists of many tiny individual fruits embedded in a fleshy receptacle.
- The brownish or whitish specks, which are commonly considered seeds, are the true fruits, called achenes, and each of them surrounds a tiny seed.
These achenes also make strawberries relatively high in fiber. According to the Wellness Encyclopedia of Food and Nutrition, one-half cup of strawberries supplies more fiber than a slice of whole wheat bread, and more than 70 percent of the recommended daily allowance of vitamin C.
- The cultivated strawberry is a hybrid of two different parent species.
- Because they are hybrids, cultivated strawberries are often able to adapt to extreme weather conditions and environments.
- While California and Florida are the largest producers, strawberries are grown in all 50 states.
- Strawberries are a significant crop in Pennsylvania, but they have a relatively short season.
According to Carolyn Beinlich of Triple B Farms, a local pick-your-own berry farm in Monongahela, Pennsylvania’s ideal strawberry season lasts three and one-half weeks. The plants form their fruit buds in the fall, so adequate moisture at that time is vital.
Since October 1996 was a rainy month, Beinlich is looking forward to a bountiful strawberry crop this season. The recipe shown here is among Beinlich’s favorites for celebrating the strawberry season. For more information about Triple B Farms, call 258-3557. Lynn Parrucci is program coordinator, and Amy Eubanks is a research assistant, at the Science Center’s Kitchen Theater.
Botanist Sue Thompson of Carnegie Museum of Natural History, also contributed to this article. *** Visit the Kitchen Theater at Carnegie Science Center to learn more about the science of cooking, and get a taste of what we’re cooking and a recipe to take home.
1 quart strawberries, washed and drained well, stems removed 3_4 cup white sugar 11_2 Tablespoons cornstarch 1 1/2 cups water 1 3-ounce package strawberry gelatin 1 9-inch baked pie shell
Boil sugar, cornstarch and water until clear (about 10 minutes). Mix well with strawberries and spoon into pie shell. Refrigerate three hours. Top with whipped cream if desired, and serve. Carolyn Beinlich of Triple B Farms will present a cooking demonstration on strawberries at the Science Center’s Kitchen Theater Sunday, June 1, at 1:30 and 3:30 p.m.
Are fruits made of plant cells?
Poached pears are soft and juicy, whereas a ripe fresh pear has a nice crunch to it. Raw carrots crunch and you need a firm bite to break a bit of, but, the carrots which have been boiling in your soup for more than an hour are beautifully soft and melt away.
- A fresh crop of lettuce has firm leaves, however, after a few days the leaves might all become soft and start to wilt.
- Fruits and vegetables can move between being crisp or soft quite easily, giving a wide variety of textures.
- These textures of your fruits and vegetables are very different to that of a steak or freshly baked bread for instance.
This is because of the plant cells of which all your fruits and vegetables are made. Bread doesn’t have these intact cells any more and a steak has animal instead of plant cells, which behave quite differently. We’ll dive into the world of plant cells, texture and turgor to understand where this all comes from.
Do fruits have living cells?
Fruits are considered as living as long as they are attached with the plant. They have cells, they grow. Think of it as a body part of the plant which acts for reproduction.