Drafts

Think of knowledge as if it’s a currency. Teachers are those who are very wealthy in knowledge, therefore are of a wealthier ‘class’, compared to students who are much less knowledgeable about the subject. When teachers are able to pour in a lot of effort and pass on their knowledge, they are helping everyone around them rise up to become better. The net benefit is overall positive, and society (the classroom in this metaphor) is doing better in the end. Of course, this metaphor falls off a bit where the teachers aren’t actually losing anything besides time. They still retain their ‘currency’, they’re just losing a different form of it that’s equal amongst everyone in society (time). I think it’s an interesting way to view teaching, since I don’t think the two are ever looked at as if they’re similar. Of course, politics should stay out of the classroom which is also why this metaphor is probably not that popular, but it definitely is something interesting to think about.

    For most students, when asked what someone’s GPA stands for, the most common answers include “the average of all your grades”, and “how smart someone is”. The first statement is inherently true, as GPA stands for “grade point average”, but how well does the second statement hold? Does someone’s GPA accurately represent how smart someone is? A value for someone’s GPA comes from how well they do in all their individual courses, whether that be maths, english, history, science, etc. The average from all these classes is then weighted then checked to see how well a student is able to perform on average, in any class. Yet is that testing how smart a student is? I personally, would argue no. Your GPA only represents how well you fair in a variety of classes, not necessarily how smart you are. In what class gauges your ability to approach unknown variables and seemingly connect them in creative ways? The Remote Associates Test is a test that is commonly used in order compare different students and their ability to be creative against one another, yet in what class is this test commonly used? As a reader, have you ever heard of this test until now?  The test gives 3 words that are associated by a 4th, and as the test taker you are to try and figure out the 4th word. For example, the 3 given words could be light/break/dream, and you would have to figure out the 4th word. Give up? The 4th word is ‘day’ (Daylight, Daybreak, Daydream). Tests like these in my opinion really do test an individual’s creativity, and it baffles me that tests like these aren’t used more often in school to accurately determine how smart a student is.

          In this experiment, a purified sample of 1, 2-diphenylethane-1, 2-diol was obtained through the reduction of benzoin with sodium borohydride and the recrystallization of the product with acetone, resulting in 71.73% yield. The product was identified to be 1, 2-diphenylethane-1, 2-diol via TLC analysis and comparison of the experimental melting point to the known melting point. The known melting point of 1, 2-diphenylethane-1, 2-diol is 138 °C, while the experimental melting point was 135-137 °C. That the experimental range is slightly lower than the known range indicates the presence of impurities in the sample, but the relatively narrow experimental range indicates that whatever impurities remain in the final sample are likely present in only small amounts. During TLC analysis, visualization was achieved via short-wave UV light and iodine staining. Iodine produced yellow stains when reacted with the pure benzoin sample in lane A of both plate 1 and plate 2, but not the samples of only the recrystallized or crude product in lane B of plates 1 and 2 respectively. This contributed to the identification of the spots derived from a mixture of benzoin and my experimental samples in lane C of both plates, in that the spot that reacted with iodine was likely benzoin, and the spot that did not react with iodine was likely the crude/recrystallized product. Rf numbers were obtained for benzoin, the crude product, and the recrystallized product. Higher Rf numbers indicate higher polarity. Benzoin is less polar than 1,2-diphenylethane-1,2-diol because alcohols are more polar than carbonyls and 1,2-diphenylethane-1,2-diol has two alcohol groups where benzoin only has one. Since benzoin is less polar, it would be expected to travel farther on the TLC plate and have higher Rf values because it has less absorption with the polar silica gel on the TLC plate than 1,2-diphenylethane-1,2-diol. In the experimental TLC analysis, spots derived from benzoin did move further than spots derived from 1,2-diphenylethane-1,2-diol. Benzoin had an average Rf value of 0.717, which is slightly beyond the ideal 0.3-0.7 range. The crude product had an average Rf value of 0.575, while the recrystallized product had an average Rf value of 0.5875. There were two additional spots derived from the recrystallized product, labelled 2 and 3 in lane B of plate 1, with an average Rf value of 0.85. This is well beyond the ideal range of 0.3 - 0.7. These spots could possibly be attributed to impurities in the sample. The Rf values exceeding 0.7 could indicate that ethyl acetate was not the best possible solvent for those substances. 

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are believed to be the main drivers of metastasis, chemoresistance, and relapse of pancreatic adenocarcinoma due to their plasticity and cooperation with the tumor microenvironment (TME) to further the disease (Sancho et al. 2016). Due to these diverse effects, eradication of CSCs poses a challenge. CSCs are also able to undergo metabolic reprogramming depending on stressors in the TME, and current literature suggests that it is the metabolic plasticity of CSCs themselves that allows for survival in different environmental stressors, leading to further metastasis (Peiris-Pagès et al. 2016). Pancreatic cancer stem cells (PaCSCs) in particular are highly dependent on mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) to survive, which serves as their preferred mechanism for energy production (Sancho et al. 2015). Another hallmark of CSCs is the notion of self-renewal, most commonly driven in PaCSCs through the Notch, Wnt/β-catenin, and Hedgehog signaling pathways (Wong et al. 2019). Therefore, the researchers plan to target PaCSCs through OXPHOS as well as self-renewal signaling in order to most effectively eradicate this metastatic driver.

Fibroblasts are cells responsible for synthesizing the stroma of animal tissue including the extracellular matrix and collagen.  In cancer, these cells can be reprogrammed to aid in tumor growth and progression. In the cancer associated fibroblasts (CAFs) of epithelial ovarian cancer, miR-31 and miR-214 were downregulated, while miR-155 was upregulated (Mitra et al 2012).  The authors also found that mimicking this induced a functional conversion of normal fibroblasts into CAFs, and reversal caused reversion of CAFs to normal fibroblasts. When miR-214 is downregulated in CAFs, the CAFs secrete high levels of the chemokine CCL5 into the tumor microenvironment.  The authors found that miR-214 is a target of CCL5. Therefore, due to the downregulation of miR-214 in CAFs, it can no longer silence the CCL5 mRNA, so it gets translated at a much higher level. CCL5 secreted by CAFs is known to be a tumor promoting factor. It is higher and involved in cisplatin resistance because it is secreted from the CAFs and signals through STAT3/PI3K/AKT on ovarian cancer cells.

Domestic horses also known for their biological name, Equus caballus, display multiple behaviors based on the conditions they are exposed to. Horses tend to graze for long periods of time throughout the day. (Goodwin 2010), and the environment has a major impact on the way the horses tend to graze (Lewis 1989). In warmer weather the horses tend to graze in various spots on the field in comparison to colder weather where the horses huddle up and graze in a couple of selected spots. It's estimated they graze about 15-17 hours a day (Sharon 1986). Horses tend to “stick together” and live in groups (Lansberg 2018).  In groups settings, horses feel more protected cause their are extra eyes that are looking out for predators and food. This results to a greater chance of survival. Groups also allow a source of protection for one's resources such as: food, water, and territory. A common behavior that has been among young “colts” or male horses, is that they tend to follow the older horses within the pack (Hill 2010), demonstrating the previously stated behavior. This will allow the colts to learn and understand the ways of life while at an early age. “Fouls” or female horses, tend to nurture their foals for about 11 months. (Crowell-Davis and Houpt 1986). Younger fouls tend to display a numerous variety of behaviors, this is known as mammalian. Horses behave depending on their surroundings and also the environment they are exposed to.

Archaeologists and development have a complicated relationship. Because of development, archaeologists are presented with fantastic opportunities to document and recover sites that they otherwise would have left untouched. It provides them with a greater understanding of certain areas as well as a more vast lexicon of knowledge that may be applied to other archaeological projects or even another area of study. Then there is the tourism aspect. This can mean both good and bad for a community, which reflects upon the archaeologists since they are usually at the forefront of the development process. This is the downside of development. It can sometimes give archaeologists a bad name. Development of dams, pipelines or commercial housing is usually received badly by most communities. They do not want largely disruptive developments on their communities. In some cases, it even destroys indigenous peoples’ sacred sites, which can be seen in the movie “Standing on Sacred Ground: Pilgrims and Tourists”. The Wintu people of California are opposed to the building of a dam because it would destroy places they hold sacred.

Game theory is the study of strategic interaction between two separate decision makers. Evolutionary game theory is communicated in the context of biology and the interaction between two animals for a valuable resource. This particular game theory is used to determine which behavioral strategy, among a series, is likely to evolve in a species. To understand the behavior of the two separate species it is important to ask when individuals should cooperate or not and when should an individual be dominant versus submissive. An example of evolutionary game theory can be seen when hawks and doves compete for food. Each animal has to decide how they should behave to maximize their fitness; should they share the resource or should they fight? A hawk will first show aggression and escalate until it wins or is injured. A dove will first show aggression and then retreat if faced with escalation. This relationship can be communicated mathematically. First, the variables must be defined. V = value of resources, C = cost of losing a fight, and a value of 0 represents no reward. If a hawk and dove are in competition, the dove will leave the interaction with a value of zero. If a hawk competes with another hawk, the interaction can be represented with the equation: (V-C)/2. The value of resources minus the cost of losing the fight is divided by two because half of the time one hawk will win and half of the time the other hawk will win. If a dove is in competition with a dove, it will be represented as V/2, because they will share the resource.

Cost benefit analysis is a concept encapsulating the idea that animals’ traits all have benefits and costs. If the costs of a trait outweigh the benefits, that trait will decrease in the population. If the benefits of a trait outweigh the costs, that trait will decrease in the population. For example, group hunting in lions is a trait essential to their survival. A few benefits of this behavior are that the lions may hunt bigger prey, conserve energy, and decrease risk of being killed. Some costs of this trait might include the lions being more easily spotted by prey, having to share the food with the pride, and the spread of disease is more likely if hunting with diseased lions. For this behavior trait to remain, it must mean that the benefits of group hunting outweigh the costs.

Natural selection is a process by which organisms are selected for based on deleterious or advantageous traits propagated by intraspecies variations in the genome. Selection pressure is a concept defined by an impact on a trait from a population’s environment, from human activity, or from other organisms. For example, if there is a population of beetles whose variations in genetics translate to a variation in color, then there are various selective pressures that might impact which color beetle is more frequent in the population. Darker beetles may benefit from increased heat absorption, which would lead to better thermoregulation and better metabolism. Beetles may also benefit from being a certain color because that is what mates are looking for. Additionally, a lighter beetle may fare better in an environment with a lighter backdrop so as to avoid predation. While there are many selective pressures, there are not as many traits. One trait can be acted upon by many selective pressures and the direction of that selection can be different for different traits.