Wonky Science: Hybrids in Startrek

[marchale]

Well, even in the same family all sorts of traits can come out. I mean one of my best friends has a white father and an African American mother. Her skin is like a very dark tan, with very curly black hair. Her sister has skin like milk and very curly auburn hair. Her brother has darker skin. So there are no sure bets.

But T'Pol does have blue eyes somewhere in her family based on her eyes and her mother.

Yeah, thats for sure. Like I said, my dad (who's only 1/8th indian) looked more indian than Rick did as a half breed; and my sister inherited those beautiful high indian cheekbones I sure wish I had, but don't. I'm not sure where my eyes came from though, I've got blue eyes (just like my dad & Rick had) but mine are dark blue and theirs were a beautiful lighter blue shade like Trip's are. (Maybe mom was right after all when she used to very jokingly say that my sister and I must've came from the mailman, since our parents both had jet black hair and my sister and I are both redheads )

[WarpGirl]

You know, I wonder what the odds of TnT having a red-head or auburn haired baby is? That would be soooooo cute with blue or green eyes and pointed ears.

[Distracted]

Well, about 15% of the population are redheads. You never know.

[WarpGirl]

I just think it would be cool for a Vulcan to have something other than dark hair. JB's fake MU blond doesn't count. Not that CT is a natural blond, but his looks more natural.

[Silverbullet]

I was wondering, do Vulcans have blood types? or can any Vulcan give a transfusion to any Vulcan.

SB

[WarpGirl]

They have blood-types! I know this one, I've been looking up to find the episodes for Spock being the first Vulcan enlisted in Federation Starfleet. So here's the transcript. Bottom line, Vulcan physiology is a pain in the you know what... http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/44.htm

Speaking of which it's a pain reading through transcripts to find one little line!!!!!!!!!!!!! That's why memory-alpha is nice because you type in the question, they give you a list of episodes you can find the answer NICE!

[Distracted]

Didn't Spock give his father a transfusion in TOS, or am I remembering that Bones said it wasn't possible? That's the only canon reference to a Vulcan getting a transfusion that I recall.

[WarpGirl]

See Above!!!!!!!!

[Distracted]

Link doesn't work for me. Not sure why.

[Cogito]

Link doesn't work for me. Not sure why.

The site seems to be down at the moment.

[Silverbullet]

Does it seem reasonable to assume that Spock and his Father would have the same Blood type? Whooops. Spock is half Human so I think his Blood would either be red, Iron based, or Green, Copper based. I can recall Bones referring to spock as being a Green blooded Vulcan. Not wholy true. Would the mixure foul up Spocks Blood Type if his blood was Vulcan? If he did give his Father a transfusion then he had Green Blood of his Fathers Blood type or Green blood with no type.

SB

[WarpGirl]

It works for me?????

Anyway I'll just quote it,

MCCOY: Well, I'm glad somebody's asking me something around here. Well, the procedure they're discussing would require tremendous amounts of blood for the patient.
CHAPEL: Doctor?
MCCOY: Yes.
CHAPEL: I've checked the blood bank. There isn't enough Vulcan blood and plasma to even begin such an operation of this type.
KIRK: There are other Vulcans aboard.
SAREK: My blood type is T-negative. Somewhat rare, even for a Vulcan.
MCCOY: Yes, I'd say that's rare.
SPOCK: My blood is T-negative, Doctor.
CHAPEL: We've run a number of blood tests on Mister Spock. It isn't true Vulcan blood either. It has human blood elements in it.
SPOCK: It should be possible to filter out the human factors.

And Dis would explain this better than I but it is possible now to filter out components of blood and separate them. Not sure it could be don't in the 60's but it's medically sound.

I'm thinking maybe they had to do a little genetic tweaking with Spock to make sure the human and vulcan elements in his blood got along.

[Distracted]

I would agree. They'd have to decide whether his blood would use iron or copper.

[WarpGirl]

Well to tell you the strict truth, the ONE thing that got me a little put off by the wonky "science" in Trek were the no help needed hybrids. BUT usually the characters are so awesome that you just gotta love it anyway. Say what you want about VOY Scarlet Pommers was adorable. And the characters are all that count.

[lfvoy]

That a blue eyed father and a brown eyed mother could have a blue eyed, brown eyed or hazel eyed baby. Brown eyed father and brown eyed mother only a brown eyed baby. However, my daughter has informed me I am wrong and she studied bio just a few years ago in College.

This is correct. High school biology covers the basics of genetics but eye color is expressed in more than one gene which is why the genetically dominant blue eyes in my family are possible. (One gene is straight Mendelian, but if a second one is "switched on" you'll have blue eyes no matter what.) The same is true for Type O blood; it's commonly called "Bombay type" because the "switch" phenomenon was first identified in what's now Mumbai. IIRC, a similar situation also exists for white-coated cats.

Which meant I got to grow up as the only brown-eyed person in a blue-eyed family. Quite legitimately. So yeah, I had reason to do the research which led me to learn this.

/geek