You are performing a karyotype for the first time and you forget to add the colchicine. How do you predict this will affect your karyotype?
A) No affect - your karyotype will look normal.
B) You will be unable to see any chromosomes under the microscope.
C) You will only be able to see one of each chromosome.
D) The chromosomes in some cells will look normal (highly compacted) but in other cells distinct chromosomes will be hard to identify.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Colchicine is a drug that prevents the separation of duplicated chromosomes during cell division, resulting in cells with double the number of chromosomes. Without colchicine, some cells in the karyotype may have normal-looking, highly compacted chromosomes while others may have distinct chromosomes that are hard to identify due to their close proximity to one another. This will result in an inconsistent karyotype where some cells may have twice the number of chromosomes as others.

You Are Performing a Karyotype for the First Time and You