Writing in Biology

Epithelial ovarian cancer accounts for approximately 90 percent of all cases of ovarian cancer. Common mutations found in epithelial ovarian cancer include BRCA1, BRCA2, and TP53. Common over expressions include cyclin E1, Rsf-1, and fatty acid synthases. High grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSC) accounts for approximately 70% of epithelial ovarian cancers, and BRCA1 mutations are more uncommon than TP53 mutations and are found in about 13% of HGSC cases. HGSC has the highest incident rates as well as the lowest survival rates among subtypes of ovarian cancer. BRCA1 mutations present in the ovarian cancer phenotype are sometimes heritable. According to new research many of HGSC cancer cells are thought to originate in the fallopian tubes and are thought to migrate to the ovaries and implant there. The function of the protein encoded by the BRCA1 gene is well characterized as a tumor suppressor.  On the contrary, although TP53 mutations are very common in ovarian cancers and TP53 is known to be a tumor suppressor as well, the role of its mutants in leading to a cancerous phenotype is not well understood. A study showed no phenotypic differences between a mutant TP53 and a TP53 knockout, so the BRCA1 mutation is of immediate interest.

    As I keep writing these varying drafts I’ve slowly started to notice how a lot of my other peers in this course are writing about scientific topics, whether that be about ocean acidification, feathers, the conservation of ecosystems, etc. I’ve started to become uneasy as maybe the possibility exists that I’ve been doing these drafts wrong, even though I’ve read the drafts PDF on Moodle several times and am quite confident I haven’t been doing anything wrong.
    It’s quite fascinating that even though I draft about topics that are more similar to journal entries, just because I see other people write about scientific subjects, I feel uneasy about continuing these kinds of drafts. What causes that uneasiness? Why do we have the feeling of uneasiness in the first place?
    Is it possible that the feeling of easiness arose as a way for us to signal to ourselves that we’re “out of place”, and that could be a detrimental component to our survivability? It’s interesting to see how biologically speaking we’ve evolved to go with the status quo, when nowadays it’s praised to go against it. Is it possible that we would eventually evolve to never feel uneasiness anymore, since maybe the future of society condones the idea of conforming to the point where it is more beneficial to not have that trait anymore?
    Then again, there are times when having that trait helps us continue to survive. For example, driving down a road with no lights in the middle of night, with no other cars in sights could potentially make you feel uneasy--and that would be for good reason. We are usually taught to make sure we are safe in whatever surroundings we found ourselves in, so it would still beneficial to own some uneasiness in that regard.
    To me, it seems that the feelings of uneasiness is similar to pain in the regard that no one wants to feel these feelings, but it’s important to be able to feel both of these sensations for our own survival.

I think one of the most important parts of the biological world to conserve is the carbon sinks of the Arctic. A recent expert assessment by scientists from the Permafrost Carbon Network, published in Nature, concluded that as much as 5%-15% of the terrestrial permafrost carbon pool is vulnerable to release in the form of greenhouse gases during this century. Stored over millennia in the Earth’s high latitudes, permafrost contains twice as much carbon as is currently in the atmosphere. As that region warms, permafrost will become vulnerable to a heightened rate of decomposition, resulting in a potentially enormous release of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. It has been estimated that with continued warming, releases of carbon from microbial decay and other sources will overwhelm the capacity for plant carbon uptake in the Arctic, leading to a switch to net carbon emissions from permafrost ecosystems to the atmosphere possibly by the middle of the 21st century. Strengthening the northern carbon sink could help to curb rising air temperatures. A weakening of the sink would only worsen the global warming already taking place. The Arctic switching from a sink to a source would cause warming increases to become more rapid, which will further increase emissions, accelerating climate change in a self-reinforcing warming cycle. Though increased carbon emissions are the most pressing issue, there is also the threat of abnormally high temperatures thawing permafrost containing long dormant microbes, which could cause disease. Some researchers cite the concern of the diseases from thawing human and animal remains getting into groundwater that people then drink, or spreading through other ways.

Water is essential to all life on Earth and is vital to both human survival and the survival of larger ecosystems. It also possesses unique properties. For instance, it has both a high boiling point and a high heat of vaporization, due to the high amount of energy needed to break the strong hydrogen bonds present in the compound. In addition, water exhibits high surface tension and cohesion due to the polarity present within its molecules, caused by the partial positive and partial negative charge on the hydrogen and oxygen atoms respectively, which attract each other and result in the molecules sticking together more so than most liquids. Water also has low viscosity, also known as a low resistance to flow, which is important in its role in things like blood circulation or acting as a solvent for biochemical reactions. Another property unique to water is that its solid form has a lower density than its liquid form, resulting in the phenomenon of ice floating in water.

Acute Myeloid Leukemia involves uncontrolled growth of immature blood-cell forming cells or hematopoietic stem cells. Normally these cells differentiate to produce red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets. However, in patients with the cancer, hematopoietic stem cells are unable to differentiate and accumulate excessively in the bone marrow. Treatment of the cancer requires not only the elimination of cancer cells (often by chemotherapy), but also replacement of the hematopoietic stem cells.

In the book “My Sister’s Keeper” Kate Fitzgerald is a teenage girl suffering from Promyelocytic Leukemia, a subset of Acute Myeloid Leukemia. When they realize there are no matches for donors within the family, they resort to an IVF procedure to genetically engineer a child that was the perfect donor match for Kate.

After reading “My Sister’s Keeper” I thought to myself, what if Anna was a result of reproductive cloning instead of IVF? First of all, it is important to note that the procedures are similar but different. In IVF, an egg is taken from the mother and and a sperm is taken from the father and they are combined in-vitro to produce a fertilized zygote which is then implanted in the mother. The newborn child may be genetically compatible with Kate, but would not be an identical match. In contrast, reproductive cloning would involve fusing a donated, enucleated egg cell with one of Kate’s cells with electricity and implanting the resulting embryo in Kate’s mother. This process is called somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT). If Anna were born through this process, then her genetic makeup would be identical to Kate’s DNA.

Based on these two articles I noticed a difference in tone; they both were written formally however the review article used more complex language and a persuasive tone, while the research article used a more factual tone. The review article analyzes research already done in primary sources, while the research article is itself a primary source of original research. The review article referred to many more external sources, while the research article referred mostly to its own sources. In text citations for both were cited in parentheses with the author and date of publication stated. For the research article citations only seemed to be used in the introductory and methods sections. The review article used citations in the form of paraphrasing of references to other scientific articles and were used to further support their argument with real facts provided from primary sources. What I learned was the difference between the two types: before I had heard and written a scientific research type article before in labs, however I had never even heard of a review article. It was also interesting to see how each varies as far as formatting and how they use in text citations professionally. What surprised me was how formal the review article was because I had expected that one to be the more simplified, easier read considering it is most likely geared for a broader audience than the research article would be.  

Diagnosing diseases is often a difficult task. The reason many people find this difficult is because of multifinality. Multifinality means that a single cause can lead to multiple outcomes. So in the case of diagnosis, multifinality makes it difficult to pinpoint an exact disease because one symptom can point to many different diseases. An example could be a lack of exercise. A lack of exercise could lead to obesity, diabetes, respiratory issues, etc. and so make it hard to figure out exactly what is wrong. Of course with one symptom, there are usually multiple and these can all lead to the same result. This idea is referred to as equifinality where multiple pathways lead to the same outcome. These ideas are important to consider during the prognosis of diseases and getting multiple opinions on health advice is usually very important.

Feather is one of the unique characteristics for birds. It serves as the fur for mammals. The primary feathers, known as contour feathers are the most common type of feathers found in birds. It has the long flat shape with a hollow stick called a calamus supporting the root and connecting to the rachis. Lateral barbs then branch off from the rachis creating the soft and smooth shaft of feather. The inner part of the feather serves as insulation, and the outer part is for different purposes. As the feather goes inward toward the body, it becomes more rigid structure to support the shape and give insulation.

Today in biochemistry, we learned about the hydrophobic effect. This is when nonpolar molucules are exposed to an aqueous environment and they bunch together. The process is driven by entropy. Molecules in nature perfer to be disordered, therefore the nonpolar molecules bunch together to minimize interactions with the polar water molecules. When polar and nonpolar molecules interact, the polar molecules form a ridgid shell around the nonpolar molecules. The polar molecules are in a tight formation and not free to move around. The polar water molecules can form dipole-dipole interactions with other polar water molecules because water has permanent, partical charges. The nonpolar molecules form van der waal interactions between themselves. This process can be seen in salad dressing when the bottle is shaken. The bubbles of oil that are formed disperse but reappear after a few minutes. 

My life after biology course started discussions this week. They are only 50 minutes long and once a week. Today we just had a basic introduction class and then went around and discussed our goals following graduation. My goal after graduating is to have a hands on job in the medical field in order to gain experience and clinical hours. Right now I am a certified nursing assistant (CNA), but I want a new job in order to get new experiences. I will work this job for about a year, and then I will start a physician assistant or nursing program.