smomalley's blog

The flu is a nucence, it seems like everyone gets it so why bother getting the flu shot? The flu shot is often neglected, according to the Centers for Disease Control, only 37% of Americans recieved their flu shot in the 2016-2017 season.  The flu shot changes every  year to keep up with the varying proteins on the virus. The vaccine is important for the recipient's protection against the flu, as well as everyone surrounding them. Certain individuals are vulnerable to disease, they are the elderly, infants, those recieving chemo-therapy, and individuals with an autoimmune disease. Individuals who are immunocompromised cannot get vaccines; vaccines should be administed several weeks before the individual becomes immunocompromised (if that is possible, such as several weeks before chemo-therapy). These immunocompromised individuals can be protected through herd immunity; when the majority of a population is vaccinated, the virus has a hard time infecting individuals.  Therefore, everyone should keep up with their flu vaccines to prevent contraction of the virus for themselves, as well as immunocompromised individuals who cannot recieve the vaccine and rely on others for protection.

In neurobilogy we leared about LoxP sites. These are areas in the DNA that correlate to each other. Thye work in the presence of CRE recombinase in order to flip the DNA sequence between the paired Lox sites, or cut it out completely. When the LoxP sites are facing the same direction, they loop the DNA between the two sites and cut the sequence between the two sites, and one of the lox sites, out of the genome. This results in two strands of DNA, each with one of the paired lox sites. CRE recocmbinase can only work on one pair of LoxP at a time, so cutting out of Lox of a pair is a perminant and irreversable change. On the other hand, if the two paired LoxP sites are facing opposite directions, they form a loop in the DNA and flip the DNA in between the LoxP sites around. For example, if the DNA inbetween the LoxP sites is in the anti-sense direction, the flipped DNA would then be in the sense direction. This is a method used by neurobiologists who want to insert a sequence of DNA into specific cells. The neuoscientist would insert a sequence of DNA in the antisense direction, between two inverted LoxP sites. The DNA sequence would be taken up by all cells in the area, but only cells expressing CRE recombinase would be able to flip the DNA sequence into the sense direction in order to express it. 

In psychology we learned that there are some cultures that do not have words for certain, or any numbers. These societies do not crumble because they don't have our version of numbers, but it is hard to imaging a society that could function without numbers. It has been proven that all human babies are born with an innate way of thinking about quantities and numbers. Innatly, we think of numbers logarythmically. We think that the jump between 1 and 2 is infanitely bigger than the jump form 8 and 9 because 1 to 2 is doubling the number while 8 to 9 is adding just a fraction of the number. This is how some of the societies without words for discrete numbers oporate. They use the logarythmic numbers that we, in our society, are much less comfortable with than our version of intervaled discrete numbers. 

Overall, this is a very organized and informative poster. The color scheme looks attractive, there are not too many words or figures, information is spread out nicely. This is a great example of a model poster.

            The design of the poster is nicely put together. The flow of information and spacing between sections is well thought out. The poster is consistent with formatting, and the typography looks good on the poster.

            The organization of the poster is satisfactory. There is a nice flow, the information is easy to find and to read. The important information is clearly displayed and explained in each section. This poster did not get full credit for organization because it does not include an abstract or a discussion section. There is a background information section that could serve as an introduction, but the abstract and discussion are left out.

            The writing of the poster is very clear and concise. The information is presented in paragraphs for the background and methods sections. There are no grammatical or spelling errors and the typography is appropriate and uniform. The poster is written in scientific writing, and the word count is appropriate for a poster.

            The content of the poster is informative and well presented. The data is presented appropriately, showing graphs with final numbers and conclusions, not raw data or statistics. All graphs have high resolution and are crisp and sharp. There does not seem to be a problem with the copyright. Overall, the poster is persuasive in that utilizing current public health information and databases does not cost more, or take time away from other patients, for the treatment of TB.  

homeostasis is the process of maintaining balance in the body system. This is done through many different pashways and feedback loops. The most common is the negative feedback loop. The negative feedback loop is one that senses a change in homeostasis, and the body system responds by eliciting the opposite reaction. This can be demonstrated by body temperature, blood glucose, and many other systems. Positive feedback loops are much more rare. These are changes sensed in homeostatsis that promote more change as a response. Positive feedback loops are often used in the context of a negative feedback loop. An example of a postitve feedback loop is the blood clotting mechanism. This is within a negative feedback loop. This positive feedback loop works by sensing a change in blood pressure at the location of the cut and signaling for platelets to plug the cut. The platelets release a signal for more and more platelets to come help. This positive feedback loop is within the negative feedback loop that then signals for the stop of platlet signaling. 

Leaf miners are a type of insect that eat the mesophyll layer of the leaf. The elm leafminer's common name is a sawfly. The adult female sawfly lays eggs on the bottom side of the leaf. These eggs hatch and the larvae burrow through the mesophyll layer of the leaf creating tracts as they eat. The leaf eventually falls to the grown in the fall, or the leaf is killed by excessive leafmining and falls to the ground. Once the leaf is on the grownd, the larvae crawl out and burrow about one inch under the top soil. The larvae form a cacoon and wait out the winter underground. In the spring the larvae hatch from the cacoon and dig their way out of the soil to emerge as an adult sawfly. The adult saw fly lays more eggs and the life cycle continues.

The majority of damage done by the leafminer is asthetic;the overall damage to the leaf is not life threatening ot the tree, but the leaves can die if too much of the mesophyll is eaten. There are insectasides available for the soil, to kill the sawfly cacoons, or for the leaves of the tree, to kill the eggs. Insectasides are expensive and time consuming. Therefore finding trees that are less likely to be attacked by sawflies is the best solution to this problem. 

Leaf miners are a type of insect that eat the mesophyll layer of the leaf. The elm leafminer's common name is a sawfly. The adult female sawfly lays eggs on the bottom side of the leaf. These eggs hatch and the larvae burrow through the mesophyll layer of the leaf creating tracts as they eat. The leaf eventually falls to the grown in the fall, or the leaf is killed by excessive leafmining and falls to the ground. Once the leaf is on the grownd, the larvae crawl out and burrow about one inch under the top soil. The larvae form a cacoon and wait out the winter underground. In the spring the larvae hatch from the cacoon and dig their way out of the soil to emerge as an adult sawfly. The adult saw fly lays more eggs and the life cycle continues.

The majority of damage done by the leafminer is asthetic;the overall damage to the leaf is not life threatening ot the tree, but the leaves can die if too much of the mesophyll is eaten. There are insectasides available for the soil, to kill the sawfly cacoons, or for the leaves of the tree, to kill the eggs. Insectasides are expensive and time consuming. Therefore finding trees that are less likely to be attacked by sawflies is the best solution to this problem. 

There is a viatamese village that historically, did not have many deaf individuals. This village had no universal way of communicating with the deaf individuals and vice versa. After generations of deaf individuals not being able to communicate, or be fully included in society, the presidents son was born deaf. This launched a new private school for disable children, specifically for the deaf. This school brough deaf children from all over the country to one location. Many of the kids had never met another deaf person before. These kids all used different ways of communicating in their home villages and had to adapt to their new environment. Over the years the communication between children became more and more uniform, eventually leading to a new sign language for the deaf individuals. This new language has been expanded and perfected over the years to create a community of deaf people in the country who can socialize and be a part of society. 

In neurobiology we have been discussing different techniques to insert a specific gene into cells. One tequnique used to do this is transgenic technique. This technique does not specifically target cells. The technique inserts a promoter and gene that you want to insert into an embryo. The embryo has natually occuring breaks in the DNA while it is developing. This means that if a break occurs the protomor and gene can be inserted into the DNA sequence. This added section can include a flourescent sequence. This allows the cells that have taken up the gene sequence to be seen so you can tell which cells or which area contains the transgene. 

The flu shot is often neglected, according to the centers for disease control, only 37% of Americans recieved their flu shot in the 2016-2017 season.  The flu shot changes every  year to keep up with the varying proteins on the virus. The vaccine is important for the recipient's protection against the flu, as well as everyone surrounding them. Certain individuals are vulnerable to disease, they are the elderly, infants, those recieving chemo-therapy, and individuals with an autoimmune disease. Individuals who are immunocompromised cannot get vaccines; vaccines should be administed several weeks before the individual becomes immunocompromised (if that is possible, such as several weeks before chemo-therapy). These immunocompromised individuals can be protected through herd immunity; when the majority of a population is vaccinated, the virus has a hard time infecting individuals.  Therefore, everyone should keep up with their flu vaccines to prevent contraction of the virus for themselves, as well as immunocompromised individuals who cannot recieve the vaccine and rely on others for protection.