SAT写作素材之“遗传学之父”分享

为什么种瓜得瓜,种豆得豆?按照遗传学的观点,道理就在于一切生物都具有遗传和变异的特性。说起遗传学,人们不禁会想起被誉为“遗传学之父”孟德尔的遗传定律——遗传定律是格里哥·孟德尔根据豌豆的研究工作总结出来的。下面给大家整理的关于这位遗传学之父的事例：

“遗传学之父”孟德尔

The theories of heredity attributed to Gregor Mendel, based on his work with pea plants, are well known to students of biology. But his work was so brilliant and unprecedented at the time it appeared that it took thirty-four years for the rest of the scientific community to catch up to it. The short monograph, Experiments with Plant Hybrids, in which Mendel described how traits were inherited, has become one of the most enduring and influential publications in the history of science.

学过生物的学生一定知道孟德尔的遗传定律——遗传定律是格里哥·孟德尔根据豌豆的研究工作总结出来的。但是在孟德尔发表这项工作的当时，人们并没有意识到它的伟大。因为这项的工作显然超越了他的时代。事实上直到他的成果公布34年后，科学界才恍然大悟。孟德尔将种性的遗传规律写成《植物杂交实验》一文。这篇简短的论文后来成为科学史上最不朽、影响力的著作之一。

Mendel, the first person to trace the characteristics of successive generations of a living thing, was not a world-renowned scientist of his day. Rather, he was an Augustinian monk who taught natural science to high school students. He was the second child of Anton and Rosine Mendel, farmers in Brunn, Moravia. Mendel's brilliant performance at school as a youngster encouraged his family to support his pursuit of a higher education, but their resources were limited, so Mendel entered an Augustinian monastery, continuing his education and starting his teaching career.

孟德尔是研究生物世代间的遗传性状的人。但是他在当时并不是个有名的科学家。更确切地说，他只是奥地利的一名修道士，同时教高中生自然科学的课程。他的父母——安东和罗莎·孟德尔——是摩拉维亚的农民，他在家中排行老二。孟德尔从小成绩优异，家里人也愿意让他接受更好的教育。但是他的家境并不宽裕，因此他只好进了奥地利的一家修道院，在那里他可以继续学习并从事教育工作。

Mendel's attraction to research was based on his love of nature. He was not only interested in plants, but also in meteorology and theories of evolution. Mendel often wondered how plants obtained atypical characteristics. On one of his frequent walks around the monastery, he found an atypical variety of an ornamental plant. He took it and planted it next to the typical variety. He grew their progeny side by side to see if there would be any approximation of the traits passed on to the next generation. This experiment was "designed to support or to illustrate Lamarck's views concerning the influence of environment upon plants." He found that the plants' respective offspring retained the essential traits of the parents, and therefore were not influenced by the environment. This simple test gave birth to the idea of heredity.

孟德尔热爱大自然，热爱科学研究。他不仅对植物充满了兴趣，同时还喜欢气象学和进化论。他经常思考植物是如何获得非典型的遗传性状的。他经常在修道院里散步，有一次散步时，他发现了一个具有非典型性状的观赏植物品种。他把这株植物取过来，种在典型的品种旁边，并把它们的子代也挨个种在旁边，想看看这样做会不会使这两种植物的子代在性状上变得接近。孟德尔设计这个实验是为了证明或者解释拉马克的观点——拉马克(法国博物学家)曾就环境对植物的影响方面提出了一些观点。但是孟德尔发现植物的子代都分别遗传了各自亲代的基本性状，并没有受到环境的影响。正是这个简单的实验孕育了遗传定律的思想。

Mendel's research reflected his personality. Once he crossed peas and mice of different varieties "for the fun of the thing," and the phenomena of dominance and segregation "forced themselves upon notice." He saw that the traits were inherited in certain numerical ratios. He then came up with the idea of dominance and segregation of genes and set out to test it in peas. It took seven years to cross and score the plants to the thousand to prove the laws of inheritance! From his studies, Mendel derived certain basic laws of heredity: hereditary factors do not combine, but are passed intact; each member of the parental generation transmits only half of its hereditary factors to each offspring (with certain factors "dominant" over others); and different offspring of the same parents receive different sets of hereditary factors. Mendel's work became the foundation for modern genetics.

孟德尔的研究工作反映了他的性格特点。因为好玩，他把不同品种的豌豆和老鼠分别进行杂交。然而杂交过程中显性和分离的现象引起了他的注意。他注意到生物的种性是按照一定的数量比率遗传的。随后他得出假设，认为基因具有显性和分离的特点，并开始着手豌豆试验来验证他的想法。他花了七年的时间对上千株豌豆进行杂交和计数，以此来验证遗传定律。孟德尔从他的研究中总结出了以下几条遗传学的基本定律：遗传因子不是混合在一起，而是各自完整地传给下一代;父本或母本都只是将各自一半的遗传因子传递给下一代(其中的一些遗传因子对另一些是显性的);而且同一亲本的不同子代也是各自得到一套特有的遗传因子。孟德尔的工作奠定了现代遗传学的基础。

The impact of genetic theory is no longer questioned in anyone's mind. Many diseases are known to be inherited, and pedigrees are typically traced to determine the probability of passing along an hereditary disease. Plants are now designed in laboratories to exhibit desired characteristics. The practical result of Mendel's research is that it not only changed the way we perceive the world, but also the way we live in it.

现在没有人会质疑遗传理论所带来的影响。我们已经知道许多疾病是可以遗传的，利用经典的绘制系谱的方法就可以确定这些疾病向下传递的概率。当今有许多实验室可以设计出具有特定性状的植物，以满足人们的不同需求。孟德尔的研究工作产生了实质性的作用：它不仅改变了我们认识世界的方法，也改变了我们的生活方式。

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