Hey Everyone,

My name is Jeremy Giampaoli and I'm a junior in high school. I'm planning on applying to Stanford and realize that I need something to stand out on my application and was pondering the idea of an experiment on ball python genetics. I have access to a fairly high quality private company's laboratory (obviously not billions of dollars of equipment) but should have most of machines I'll be needing. This is just in the development stage and I had some questions to see if my dream could become a real experiment.

1) Has anyone done an in-depth experiment on ball python genetics before? Not just a normal dom, co-dom, recessive trait test, but identifying the chromosomes and gene changes between different morphs?

2) Can anyone with scientific experience tell me if it's possible to extract DNA from two different morphs of BP and be able to identify the discrepancies? Also, if identified, would injecting them into, lets say, a normal BP change the phenotype or genotype of the animal?

3) Would any breeder (or anyone for that matter) in the Southern California area (I'm in Torrance) potentially be willing to loan me a few ball pythons? If I follow through with this project, I would test out the experiment on my own normal BP as long as it is safe. I was thinking just a few simple morphs (dom, co-dom, and recessive) like spider, lesser, and albino or something of the like. If successful, then possibly moving on to two gene animals.

Thanks in advance for your input,

Jeremy Giampaoli