My PBL Project

INTRODUCTION: My project is to build a T4 Bacteriophage and research about it. I have to build a physical model of the T4 Bacteriophage and then explain about the structure of it.

Driving Question: "What are viruses? How does the structure of a virus relate to its ability to infect cells, replicate, and cause diseases?"

MATERIALS:

- Pipe Cleaners
- Paper Fold
- Glue
- Camera

PROCEDURE:

1.You will need to get all the required materials: pipe cleaners, paper fold, and glue.

3.You will need to make the collar (neck), it can be anything.

2.You will need to make an origami fold of a icosahedron (the Bacteriophage head) and the the T4 Bacteriophage's sheath (body), or you can use other materials for the sheath.

4. You will use the pipe cleaners as the T4 Bacteriophage's legs.

5.You will glue your handmade icosahedron onto the collar.

6. Then you will glue that to the T4 Bacertiophage sheath.

7. Next, glue the pipe cleaners to the end of the sheath, to make the legs.

8. (Optional) you can make small little arms by gluing small pipe cleaners to the T4 Bacteriophage's sheath near the head.

SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLE/ ESSENTIAL UNDERSTANDING:

The virus needs a host in order to replicate. Virus can not live without a host. They have to replicate in order to keep living. A bacteriophage can only infect bacteria. A T4 Bacteriophage can infect bacteria and replicate faster than any other bacteriophages. Once a T4 Bacteriophage has completely infected the host, the host cell will burst and virus particles will spread throughout the area. The cycle will keep repeating until the virus has died out.

Investigation Questions:

What is a virus? What features do all viruses have in common? A virus is a small parasite that infects animals and plants' living cells. The common thing about viruses are they both need a host and they are parasites.
1. Does the virus you chose to model have a capsid? If so, how did you represent the capsid in your model? The T4 Bacteriophage does have a capsid; the icosahedral head is represented as a capsid.
2. Does the virus have an envelope? If, so how the envelope represented in the model? The T4 Bacteriophage does have a envelope, it's the protein that covers the capsid.
3. Does the virus have DNA or RNA? Is the viral genome single-stranded or double-stranded? The T4 Bacteriophage are DNA and double-stranded.
4. Viruses "hijack" cells by gaining entry into the cell and use cell structures to replicate new viruses. What part of the virus model relates to how this virus would attach to and enter the cell host? The T4 Bacteriopages uses its "tail" to attach to the host. Then, the virus would pass on its nucleic acids to infect the host.
5. What cell does the virus infect (that is, what are the host cells of the virus)? They infect the host cells with there long tail fibers.
6. How does the virus eventually kill the host? After the host cell is infected, the host's cell burst open spreading into the environment.
7. Which host cell organelles are used by viruses for their reproduction? When the virus gets into the host cells they inject DNA to reproduce.
8. How is the virus genome replicated? The virus attaches to the host's cell and then inject it's nucleic acid into the cells, and then replication starts.
9. Does the replication of the virus you modeled most resemble a lytic cycle or lysogenic cycle? Describe how the virus makes more viruses? It resembles a lytic cycle. The virus attaches its tail to the host's cell, and then injects its nucleic acid DNA/RNA into the cell, which reproduces more viruses.
10. Why aren't viruses called cells? Because viruses are not a living organism.

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