Winging It: Analyzing a Scientific Paper

In this activity, students analyze aspects of a scientific paper that investigates genes involved in the colors and patterns of butterfly wings.

This paper shows how evolutionary biologist Robert Reed and his colleagues used the biotechnology tool CRISPR-Cas9 to inactivate a number of butterfly genes and determine their functions. Students’ analyses of the paper are scaffolded by having students review the abstract and introduction, make a concept map of important terms in the paper, and interpret a subset of the results. 

The “Resource Google Folder” link directs to a Google Drive folder of resource documents in the Google Docs format. Not all downloadable documents for the resource may be available in this format. The Google Drive folder is set as “View Only”; to save a copy of a document in this folder to your Google Drive, open that document, then select File → “Make a copy.” These documents can be copied, modified, and distributed online following the Terms of Use listed in the “Details” section below, including crediting BioInteractive.