Rehpic's Guide To Flax Genetics

Definitions

Base - The basic genitic unit. Each base is represented by a letter below.
Trait - A measurable property of the flax, such as the production of a seed or rotten flax.
Gene - A string of consecutive bases in a particular pattern that causes a trait to be expressed.
Genome - The complete collection of genetic material for a particular strain of flax.

The Theory of Crossbreeding and Stressed Breeding

Note: These theories were developed by others.  I include them here because understanding them is essential for understanding the rest of this document.

The genome of the flax plant is a string of  bases.  Some of these bases form the correct patterns for genes, and cause traits to be expressed.  Stressed breeding rotates the bases, taking one base from one end and adding it to the other end.  For example, lets say we have a plant with the genome ABACBDBC.  If we do a left stress the resulting plant will have a genome of BACBDBCA.  The A base was taken from the left side and placed on the right side.  A right stress would produce CABACBDB.

Crossbreeding works by taking some of the bases from the left of one genome and splicing them together with some bases from the right of another genome. 

In the example below I will use a period to indicate the splice point in the child genome. It is not part of the genome, but is there to make understanding the results easier.

Lets say we have Parent#1 with a genome of AAABBB and Parent #2 with a genome of CCCDDD.  If we cross them with Parent#1 on the left and Parent#2 on the right, we can get many different child genomes.  Some examples include:

A.CCDDD
AAAB.D
AAA.DDD
AA.CCDDD
AAABB.D

Flax Traits

Flax has several observable traits:
I've heard rumors about other flax traits, such as flax that won't grow with people around, and flax beds that produce seeds for far longer than "normal".  I've yet to find concrete evidence of these.  Teppy has made comments to the effect that flax is mysterious and much more complex than we expect, so who knows what else we may eventually find.

The Bases

I have identified four unique bases for flax, which I call S, E, F, and L.  I have not yet exhaustively tested every base in both Nile Green and Old Egypt, so there could be more bases hiding there, but I believe that is very unlikely.  I use 'x' to represent bases that have not yet been identified.

Flax Genes

I have identified the following genes:

Gene
 Base Pattern
 Description
Seed Production
 SE
 Each occurrance of this gene causes another seed to be produced
Weed/Water Reduction
 ES
 Each occurrance of this gene causes the number of weedings/watering to be reduced
Flax Production
 FLFL
 Each occurance of this gene causes another flax to be produced
Rotten Flax Production
 SSFL
 Each occurrance of this gene causes another rotten flax to be produced
Dead Zone Resistance #1
 FSE
 The presence of this gene makes the flax resistant to one type of dead zone
Dead Zone Resistance #2 SEL
 The presence of this gene makes the flax resistant to one type of dead zone

Genes can overlap and share bases.  For example, consider the base sequence FSEL.  This sequence of bases results in the following three genes being expressed:
One interesting case is Flax Production.  The sequence to produce one flax is FLFL.  Each FL added to this sequence adds another flax, so FLFLFLFL produces 3 flax.

Another important case is Seed Production and Weed/Water Reduction. By creating a string of alternating E's and S's, you get both genes for the price of one.  The sequence SESESE gives you three seeds, and an additional two Weed/Water Reduction genes effectively for free.

The trick to getting the most out of flax strains is to organize the genes in a way that packs the genes into the genome most efficiently.  The gene sequences FLFLSEFLFLSSFLES and SSFLFLFLSES both produce the same traits(2 flax, 1 rotten flax, 1 seed, 1 water reduction), but the latter is much more efficient..

Weeding and Watering

Weeding and watering is still not completely understood.  For strains that produce large quantities of flax, it appears that every 3 flax adds a required watering, and every ES gene removes one watering.  Better understanding of weeding and watering is an area for continued research.

Rotten vs. Normal Flax

Based on my current understanding of the rotten flax gene, it is much less efficient to do large quantities of rotten flax than normal flax.  Using a string of 24 bases, you could make the following strains:
For my production flax strains, I'm currently focusing on all normal flax, since this is the most efficient.

It is still possible that there may be a more compact representation of multiple rotten flax.  This is an area for continued research.

Dead Zones

Some flax strains will not produce normal flax in certain areas, even though these areas have no pollution detectable by the ecology skill (heavy metals, low water table, or acidity).  These "Dead Zones" come and go.  Some flax strains have genes that make the flax resistant to the dead zones (meaning that they are uneffected by the dead zone).  I have identified two different types of dead zones.  Resistance to each type of dead zone is controlled by a different gene.  Dead Zone #1 resistance comes from the gene FSE.  Dead Zone #2 comes from the gene SEL.  I've tested the following strains:

Strain
 Resistant to
Dead Zone #1
 Resistant to
Dead Zone #2
Nile Green
 Yes
 Yes
homegrown#48
 No
 No
rehpicbronze
 No
 No
rehpicsilver
 No
 Yes

Flax Strains

I have studied several flax strains in detail.  I have done a complete set of stresses of Nile Green, Old Egypt, and homegrown#48 to determine the gene locations and length of the genome.

Nile Green

Nile Green is one of the original flax strains handed out by the SArt.  It has a very short genome, only 27 bases, but in contrast to Old Egypt, most of them are part of useful genes.

Nile Green
Flax
 2
Rotten Flax
 0
Seeds
 1
Weeding
 1
Watering
 1
Dead Zone #1 Resistance
 Yes
Dead Zone #2 Resistance
 Yes
Genome Length
 27

Nile Green Genome

1
 2
 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27
E S x x F L F L F L x x x x E S x x x F S E L x E S S

Click here for complete stress data on Nile Green.

Old Egypt

Old Egypt
Flax
 1
Rotten Flax
 0
Seeds
 1
Weeding
 2
Watering
 0
Dead Zone #1 Resistance
 Yes
Dead Zone #2 Resistance
 Yes
Genome Length
 39

Old Egypt Genome: Coming Soon

homegrown#48

homegrown#48 proved to be a good strain to work with because it has a long genome with several nice strings of genes.

homegrown#48
Flax
 9
Rotten Flax
 2
Seeds
 3
Weeding
 0
Watering
 1
Dead Zone #1 Resistance
 No
Dead Zone #2 Resistance
 No
Genome Length
 42

homegrown#48 Genome

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42
E S E S x S S F L F L x x F L F L F L F L F L F L S S F L F L F L F L x x x S E S E

Click here for complete stress data on homegrown#48.

rehpicsilver

This is currently my best flax strain.  It was engineered by using stressed breeding and cross breeding to align genes in the most efficient known patterns.

rehpicsilver
Flax
 14
Rotten Flax
 0
Seeds
 5
Weeding
 0
Watering
 1
Dead Zone #1 Resistance
 No
Dead Zone #2 Resistance
 Yes
Genome Length
 41-43

rehpicsilver Genome: Coming Soon

Continuing Research

Document ToDo List

This is a list of things that need to be added to this document.