NAME: Lucy Robbins

CLASS: Science 1 period

DATE: April 7, 2014
PLANARIA LAB REPORT

PROBLEM: If trisected, which piece of a planarian will regenerate first?

HYPOTHESIS: If trisected, then the head will regenerate first.

THEORY: Planaria are flat worms that can reproduce either sexually or asexually.
Planaria are a hermaphrodites which mean that they both planaria contain female
and male reproductive parts. These reproductive parts are called gonads. When they
reproduce sexually, two planarian exchange sperm and the sperm then travels up
their ovaries. Once they sperm travels to their ovaries, they go there separate ways
and lay eggs. When the condition is less ideal, then planaria can reproduce asexually.

Planaria have the ability to produce asexually. When planaria reproduce
asexually it only requires one planarian then two. The two methods are
fragmentation, and spontaneous tailing dropping. During the process of
spontaneous tailing dropping, the planarian drop their tails in stagent water. When
they drop their tails, a planaria will start to grow from that tail and the planarian
will regenerate a new tail. On the other hand, the process of fragmentation occurs
when the planarian splits itself into three different sections. Then, the three sections
of the planaria regenerate into new planarians. These planarians will be clones of
the original one. These two methods are effective but not as effective as sexual
reproduction. Asexual reproduction is more time consuming but is still a method
that many planaria use.

Neoblasts are undifferentiated stem cells that allow the planaria to
regenerate. Neoblasts are basically stem cells and stem cells are undifferentiated
cells of a multicellular organism. Most planaria are made of toti-potent cells, which
are cells that are capable of becoming any cell. When the planarian regenerates the
neoblastas start to blastima the wound, which means cluster around the wound.
Then, the cells begin to divide and differentiate. When they start to do that, a new
planarian will start to regenerate. It will contain 30% of the neoblasts from the
other planarian. In my hypothesis I thought that the head would regenerate the
fastest the head is the main controller of the body, so it would regenerate the fastest.








DATA:




CONCLUSION:

In this lab we trisected a planarian to see what section will regenerate the
fastest. I hypothesized that the head would regenerate the fastest than the mid
section and the posterior. My data shows by day 3 the most pigmentation was
showing and the anterior, was growing much faster than the mid section and the
anterior. 8% of our classes planarias anterior grew the fastest out of 45. For our 1
st

period class, 54% out of 51 planarians mid sections grew the fastest and 38% of
students in my class hypothesized that the posterior will regenerate the fastest. In
conclusion, I hypothesized that the anterior will regenerate the fastest; according to
the data my hypothesis was incorrect.


ANALYSIS:

Our results were invalid because when I predicted that the anterior would
regenerate the fastest, but it turned out that the posterior regenerated faster. Only
38% of the 7
th
grade chose that the posterior would regenerate the fastest. I thought
that this was odd because only 38% of the 1
st
period class only chose that the
posterior would regenerate the fastest compared to the whole 7
th
grade which 14%
of everyone chose. I also thought that it was odd because 49% of everyone in the 7
th

grade chose that the mid section would regenerate the fastest. In conclusion there
were many discrepancies in my prediction.


8
54
38
37
49
14
0
20
40
60
80
100
Anterior Mid Section Posterior
%

F
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r
s
t

R
e
g
e
n
e
r
a
t
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o
n

2014 Regeneration Data
1st Period
7th Grade