Writing in Biology

Gianna Jensen is a young woman who has gained attention around the world for her inspiring story of living life as an abortion survivor. Jensen was born two months premature after her failed abortion; weight only 2.5lbs. She spent the first few months of her life in the hospital and then entered the foster system. The failed abortion resulted in Jensen being diagnosed with cerebral palsy and doctors who cared for her said she would never be able to even lift her head. Jensen refused this prognosis and by three years old was able to walk. As an adult she defied the odds further by running marathons.

Atropine would enter the synaptic cleft and bind to the receptors that usually bind to ACh. This means the atropine is acting as a competitive inhibitor. This function can work as an antidote because instead of ACh continuously binding to the receptors unable to be removed from circulation, atropine would bind to some of the receptors, making ACh unable to bind. When atropine is bound to the receptor it doesn’t elicit a response so the unwanted response is unable to be triggered by the ACh.

            With a new retrovirus killing domestic dogs at significant speeds leading to extinction within a few months, and with only enough vaccine to save one pregnant mother and her puppies, it is essential that we deliver this vaccination to a pregnant Doberman pinscher. The main reason being that it contains the DNA of many other breeds such as the Rottweiler, German Shorthaired Pointer, Weimaraner, Manchester Terrior, Beauceron, Great Dane, Black and Tan Terrior, and Greyhound. This being said with advancements in technologies and cloning capabilities in the process, we can extract the specific DNA for those dogs and potentially give rise to those breeds once again.

Dobermans are extremely noble dogs and are perfect for those who want a gentle dog and have a newborn to those who want a fierce dog to go hunting with. They have been used in war time in the front line with soldiers and have countless records of protecting and alerting their soldiers and even giving life to defend their soldiers, receiving honorable metals posthumously. This was seen during World War II in 1944 during the Battle of Guam when Kurt, the Doberman, warned his soldiers of enemy troops in the area and soon after was killed by a grenade, saving 25 other Marines. He became the first of 25 canines to be buried in the War Dog Cemetery, as well as a statue of him was erected in the cemetery with the 24 other dogs on it.  

Most importantly, Dobermans are extremely smart, and according to Canine Psychologists, they are the fifth most intelligent dogs in the world. It is extremely important to have one of the top intelligent breeds as we can use them for many purposes and can generate an increase efficiency in society and other parts of our social and economic structure.

How do individual OSNs that express a single type of odorant receptor (OR) converge onto the same glomerulus in the OB
- odor info is detected by ~1000 different olfactory epithelial ORs and this is topographically represented by the ~1000 pairs of glomeruli in each OB
HOW is this target precision achieved??
Mouse
- ~1000 functional OR genes in the mouse, comprising 4% of all protein-coding genes in the genome, are dedicated to olfaction
- largest multigene family in mouse
- OR genes are clustered at ~50 different loci that are scattered among most of the chromosomes
- “one neuron – one receptor” rule = one allele (paternal or paternal) per neuron
- the OR gene choise in mouse appears to be stoachastic (one allele)
HOW is it that a single OR gene is chosen and activated from a repertoire of 2000(3000)?
What kind of mechanism would be possible to maintain the expression of only a single OR gene in each OSN??, these are the possibilities:
1.) DNA recombination
2.) gene conversion
3.) regulation by a locus control region (LCR)

This is what I need to study for my next exam:
SLEEP – CIRCADIAN RHYTHMS
Circadian rhythm –
1. Fluctuations in alertness, energy and mood over the course of the day.
Biological clock: ~24 hr period
2. These shifts are related to underlying bodily processes
Daily cycles occur in: hormone production, body T, blood pressure
3. Changes as we get older
EX: we don’t wake up as early now as we used to as kids
4. We seem to function better (both cognitively/ physically) in our peak time:
MEQ = “morningness eveningness questionnaire”
- college studens are mostly neutral&evening
- adults over 60 = 80% morning
5. Our circadian cycles run a little bit long. We see evidence of this in: Jet Lag (it is difficult to go from east to west), Monday morning
blues
Why Do We Sleep?
Nobody really knows, but here are a few theories…
1. Sleep provides some essential biological function
- Evidence: make up lost sleep, sleep deprivation effects: moody/irritability, mental work suffers (major accidents), immune system,
sleep debt, etc
- Problems with this theory: the amount of sleep any individual needs varies,
motivation can overcome cognitive deficits (like money),
too much sleep increases mortality rates (7-8 hrs optimal, 10 hours = 2x
as high mortality rate)
Paradox: when allowed to free-run, people sleep 9-10 hrs/day

The experiment we decided to run is comparison of physical attributes between the campus pond and the nearby puffers pond. The physical attributes we tested were temperature, pH, turbidity, plankton diversity, emergent vegetation, submerged vegetation, water velocity and direct and general biodiversity of surroundings. The temperature was tested by approaching the shore and inserting a the thermometer into the water for 1 minute and recording the resulting temperature after the minute. pH was tested by inserting a pH strip into the water and approximating the pH based on the color that appeared. Turbidity was tested using a homemade secchi disk, which was constructed by attaching a rock covered in tin foil to a piece of string of approximately 3 feet. This homemade disc was then lowered into the water and the length of rope submerged was recorded. Plankton biodiversity was tested using a plankton net and then by taking a 1 mL sample and counting the amount of organism present in the sample. Emergent and submerged vegetation were recorded as present and not present. Water velocity and direction was found by a bottle of water filled up halfway and recording the time it took to travel a set distance. General biodiversity was recorded through descriptions of the vegetation and wildlife seen around the bodies of water.

For the 60:40 hexane:EtOAC mixture, the Rf value of 2-naphthol was 0.406 and the Rf value of the product was 0.417. It can be concluded that the 60:40, hexane:EtOAC, was the best solvent mixture due to the fact that the Rf values are within the ideal Rf range of 0.3-0.7. TLC indicated that the product was pure because there were no traces of the starting material (2-naphthol). Therefore it can be concluded that the reaction was successful since the TLC plates showed no trace of other compounds in the final product of butyl naphthyl ether. In all instances the substances traveled an acceptable distance to the top and they did not smudge over each other.

The plates were run in a 9: 1 of CH2Cl2: ethanol, which is a moderately polar solvent.  The starting material (benzoin) had an R_f value of 0.75 on both plates.  The crude R_f (0.44) and recrystallized R_f (0.48) traveled less distance on the plate than benzoin indicating their increased polarity.  Hydrobenzoin is less polar than benzoin because secondary alcohols are more polar than ketones.  Sodium borohyhdride was selected as the reducing agent in this experiment instead of more explosive lithium aluminum hydride, and it is selective in reducing only aldehydes and ketones.  Sodium borohydride was sufficient for fully reducing the benzoin, demonstrated by the lack of observed benzoin in both crude and recrystallized products. 

Group proposal characteristics

physical characteristics:

1.temperature

2. pH

3. Turbidity

4. sampling plankton for biodiversity

5. Emergent vegetation

6. Submerged vegetation

7. Water velocity and direction

8. General biodiversity of surroundings

ponds to compare

    campus pond

    puffers pond

​Most of the characterisitcs will be tested on a present versus not present basis and or on a comparison bassis between the two ponds

If only one breed of dog can be saved from extinction, the chosen breed should be the Golden Retriever. The Golden Retriever is a common household dog, and is well loved by nearly all dog lovers. The fact that only one breed of dog would remain means that anybody who would want a dog as a pet would be stuck with whatever breed is left. Other breeds (such as pit-bulls) are very divisive in the community, with some people liking the breed and others hating it. The saving of this highly loved breed should leave nearly everybody satisfied. Another beneficial factor of saving a Golden Retriever is that the average litter size is eight puppies, sometimes being up to 12 puppies. This means that the one saved dog would be able to produce many children, and begin to build up a population.