The Chromosomal Battle Book

Based on the children’s book, The Butter Battle Book, by Dr. Seuss

By Ethan Julius and Travis Smith

Once upon a time in the land of Zookerville, there was a diverse community of Zooks who ate their bread with the butter side up.

Everyone was happy until Miss Sense moved to town. She ate her bread with the butter side down.

Miss Sense started to influence some of the Zooks. They began to eat their bread with the butter side down.

Not all of the Zooks were happy about this and decided to form their own separate group called the Yooks who ate bread with the butter side up.

In response, the followers of Miss Sense decided to call themselves Xooks who ate their bread with the butter side down.

As the two groups became more and more irritated with each other they began to move away from each other. The Yooks and Xooks lived on separate sides of Zookville and called each side Yookville and Xookville. They built a wall to divide them and refused to associate with each other.

As time moved on both the communities started to change again. Both Xookville and Yookville had citizens who had different opinions about the type of bread they used. Some liked whole wheat and others liked white. So these citizens started to join together and slowly branch off of from their original communities.

XookvilleNew Xookville

YookvilleNew Yookville

The two new communities called themselves New Xookville and New Yookville. The New Xooks ate their white bread with the butter side down and the New Yooks ate their whole wheat bread with the butter side up.

New Xooks

New Yooks

In the end of this sad tale there lay a community reduced and divided into four separate villages each with its own unique feelings about eating whole wheat or white bread with the butter side up or down.

XookvilleNew Xookville

YookvilleNew Yookville

Meiotic Analogies

Zookerville (slide 1) is a diploid cell.Zooks (slide 1) represent the chromosomes.When two groups of Zooks, one who eats their bread butter side up and one who eats bread with the butter side down, form and have different opinions, they represent Synapsis, the groups being the newly formed tetrads.Crossing over is represented by the fact that two new groups, Xooks and Yooks, were originally Zooks, and had friends and a similar cultural background, and they bring this along with them to their new factions. That, is the end of Prophase 1.Metaphase 1 and Anaphase 1 occurred when the Xooks and the Yooks began to hate one another, and so they began to move to separate places. As this was occurring, a wall was built between the general areas of both factions, and so not everyone who was a member of a certain faction was on the right side. This is Independent Assortment as well as the pulling apart of the tetrads. When the wall was finished, the two new towns of Xooks and Yooks were formed, representing two new duplicated haploid cells. This represents Telophase 1.

Meiosis I

Meiotic Analogies

The Xooks and Yooks who are fighting over the proper type of bread that cause the conflict in the two new towns represents Prophase 2. Once again the “chromosomes” condense in each “cell”. Metaphase 2 is represented by the intensified conflict within the two towns, threatening the tearing apart of the towns. Anaphase 2 occurs when the New Xooks and New Yooks move away from Yookville and Xookville to create their own two new towns. Telophase 2 occurred when New Xookville and New Yookville were formed, the towns representing the two new haploid cells. In the end, there are four different towns (4 haploid cells) with different political views (genetic codes).

Meiosis 2

Seuss. The Butter Battle Book. New York City: Random, 1984.

The Berlin Wall. Picture. 19 Mar. 2009http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/images/Europe/factfile/Berlin_Wall.jpg

Seuss characters. Picture. 19 Mar. 2009http://stevelutz.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/a gue-seuss.jpg

Arguement. Picture. 19 Mar. 2009http://www.parents-in-a-pickle.com/image-files/sibling-rivalry.jpg

Bread and Butter. Picture. 19 Mar. 2009http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson_images/lesson936/butteredtoast-200.jpg

Steps of Meiosis. Chart. 19 Mar. 2009 <http://www.uic.edu/classes/bios/      bios100/lecturesf04am/lect16.htm>.

Bibliography