Lion fish are a popular marine aquarium fish species. They are native to the tropical waters of the western Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately, they have been released into the water off the southeastern United States and are rapidly spreading through the Caribbean Sea. They are voracious eaters of small fish and have few natural enemies.

a) What would you expect to happen to the population of this species over the next few years?

b) How is this species likely to influence other species and the natural ecosystem?

c) Lion fish have poisonous spines. How might this affect their success?

d) What can and should be done about this introduction? Consider this question from an educational and a scientific perspective.

Proteins are the workhorses of the cell, controlling virtually every reaction within as well as providing structure and serving as signals to other cells. proteins are long chains of  amino acids  , and the exact sequence of the amino acids determines the final structure and function of the protein. instructions for that sequence are encoded in  genes  . to make a particular protein, a messenger ribonucleic acid (mrna) copy is made from the gene (in the process called  transcription  ), and the mrna is transported to the  ribosome  . protein synthesis, also called  translation  , begins when the two ribosomal subunits link onto the mrna. this step, called initiation, is followed by elongation, in which successive amino acids are added to the growing chain, brought in by transfer rnas (trnas). in this step, the ribosome reads the  nucleotides  of mrna three by three, in units called  codons  , and matches each to three nucleotides on the trna, called the anticodon. finally, during termination, the ribosome unbinds from the mrna, and the  amino acid  chain goes on to be processed and folded to make the final, functional protein

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