“Biology Examples Give MIT Students a New Perspective on Chemistry - Howard Hughes Medical Institute” plus 4 more |
- Biology Examples Give MIT Students a New Perspective on Chemistry - Howard Hughes Medical Institute
- Asylum Research Announce First AFM in Biology Class - Azom.com
- Calorie Intake Linked To Cell Lifespan, Cancer Development - Redorbit.com
- British scientists genetic breakthrough brings new hopes for cancer ... - English_Xinhua
- Scientists use light to map neurones' effects on one another - Science Centric
| Biology Examples Give MIT Students a New Perspective on Chemistry - Howard Hughes Medical Institute Posted: 18 Dec 2009 07:44 AM PST
|  December 18, 2009 Biology Examples Give MIT Students a New Perspective on Chemistry When Allison Hamilos came to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology last year, she dreaded having to take the mandatory general chemistry course for freshmen. Eyeing a future in medicine, she couldn't see much point in learning chemistry. "I didn't like chemistry at all in high school," says Hamilos, now a sophomore. "I was really surprised to find out how much I liked it in college and how relevant it is to biology. (It) has been my favorite class at MIT so far."
That's exactly what Hamilos's teacher, HHMI Professor Catherine Drennan, had in mind when she infused her introductory chemistry lectures with examples from biology and medicine. "I have been totally amazed by the huge impact this small change has made in terms of the students' attitude about the connections between biology and chemistry," Drennan says. "They really see that chemistry is the heart of biology and that is a big change." This relatively simple approach generated an enthusiasm and an improved appreciation for chemistry that was so significant Drennan and her colleagues published the results in the December issue of the journal ACS Chemical Biology. She hopes that success can be replicated in chemistry classes across the country. The full curriculum can be found on MIT's web site at http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Chemistry/5-111Fall-2008/BiologyTopics/index.htm. The link is also available in HHMI's Cool Science for Educators site. While scientific research increasingly takes place at the interface of disciplines, most undergraduate classes are still taught within the confines of traditional science fields: physics, chemistry, biology. As a result, students often view disciplines as separate and unrelated. That is true for the roughly 200 students in MIT 5.111 or Principles of Chemical Science, the introductory chemistry class that Drennan teaches. It's intended for students who have taken high school chemistry – but may lack a strong background in the subject – and so it tends to attract students who are not interested in chemistry or those who think that they are not good at it. Drennan, a chemist who has long been interested in education, decided to use part of the $1 million grant she received as an HHMI Professor to change that perception among a subset of MIT students. Drennan and co-instructor, Elizabeth Vogel Taylor, who received a Ph.D. in bioorganic chemistry at MIT, developed examples based on biological and medical topics that demonstrate basic chemical principles. "I wanted to do something that anyone could replicate with a minimal amount of effort," says Drennan, who has since been named an HHMI investigator. "If you really want to affect change, it needs to start at a level where it is practical and easy to do." The examples and problem sets link specific chemistry lecture topics to biology. One example is electron exchange of oxidation/reduction reactions, a common introductory chemistry topic, and its link to the activation of vitamin B12 in the body. Hamilos' favorite example relates tothe wave-particle duality of light and matter, which Drennan and Taylor explained through quantum dot nanoparticles, small semiconductors that emit light when excited by UV radiation. They then showed how quantum dots can be used to help create images of tumors. The teaching team used clickers—handheld electronic devices that let students respond to questions posed by professors in real time—to make some of the biology examples interactive. The instructors would propose problems for the students to solve during class and offer multiple answers. The students answered the questions using the clickers, and the results were displayed immediately on the overhead projector. This gave Drennan and Taylor immediate feedback on what percentage of the students understood the concepts and which students still needed help."It allowed us to see if students were understanding the (biology) concepts and adjust if we needed to," Taylor says. "It also kept the students engaged." Drennan and Taylor enlisted Rudy Mitchell, an educational researcher from MIT's Teaching and Learning Laboratory, to help them assess whether the students learned anything different from the biology examples. Mitchell developed a survey that the introductory chemistry students completed at the end of the course,in addition to the standard end of course evaluations. The researchers compared students who took the class from Drennan and Taylor during three different years: 2006, when the class contained no biology examples; 2007, when only half of the course contained biology examples; and 2008, when the entire course included biology examples. The standard year-end course evaluations showed a statistically significant increase from 2006 to 2008 in three areas -- the number of students who were satisfied with the course;the number of students who claimed the course inspired interest in chemistry; and the total number of students who said the course used good examples. Of the students who were exposed to the biology examples, 86 percent reported that the examples helped them to see the connection between biology and chemistry. "Even more interesting was the student attendance in the course," Mitchell says. "Large lecture classes often suffer from poor attendance. But 85 percent of students reported attending 90 percent or more of the lectures. That's unheard of in a lecture with 200 students, and it speaks to how enthusiastic the students are about the course." Mitchell noted that students viewed the experience very positively, describing it as meaningful, effective, enjoyable, supportive, motivating, and challenging. Her student's perception of this class is important to Drennan because she sees herself in her chemistry-avoiding students."I had taken chemistry in high school and hated it. So when I was told I had to take chemistry I wasn't happy at all. But (I) fell in love with it," she says. "I almost missed out entirely. My life would have been very, very different if the person teaching that course hadn't been able to reach me." Drennan discovered that many of the MIT freshmen she encountered harbored similar reservations about chemistry. "I talk quite openly about it in class," she says. "I tell my students, you may not have discovered your love for chemistry yet, but I'm going to show you how it is applicable."She hopes that by showing her students how chemistry is related to other disciplines she can help them become better doctors or engineers or maybe even chemists. She has at least made one student look at her life choices. "I'm actually considering choosing chemistry as a major now," Hamilos says. "I would have never predicted that!"
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| Asylum Research Announce First AFM in Biology Class - Azom.com Posted: 17 Dec 2009 08:31 PM PST Atomic Force F+E and Asylum Research, the technology leader in scanning probe/atomic force microscopy (AFM/SPM) announce the first European AFM in Biology Class to be held February 23-25, 2010 at Atomic Force Corporate office in Mannheim, Germany.This world-renowned class, held at Asylum Research in Santa Barbara for the past six years, is open to all Atomic Force Microscopy users that want to increase their knowledge of AFM in biology and the life sciences. The class combines lecture with extensive hands-on sessions for personal instruction and interaction with the Asylum and Atomic Force technical staff. "We cover all the essential AFM topics that biologists need and want to learn about - from sample preparation to advanced imaging and force measurements," said Dr. Irène Revenko, Applications Scientist and class director. "I am very excited to be teaching the lessons and experiments that we've done for so many years in Santa Barbara here in Europe at the Atomic Force facility. The class is fun, with a good mix of lecture and equipment time." Commented previous class attendee Dr. Yael Dror of Oxford University, "You all did a remarkable job in all areas! I am especially grateful for your sincere willingness to help each of us and the time and energy you spent with me to help, explain, guide and think together about my results. But above all you shared with us your love of the AFM, which couldn't possibly be ignored, and gave us an insight into a very special company." This comprehensive three day course covers all major topics for AFM in biology, including sample prep, force measurements, and imaging DNA, proteins, lipids and live cells. The Asylum Research MFP-3D AFM is used exclusively for the hands-on sessions. Class size is limited. A PDF of the registration form can be downloaded from the Asylum Research web site at www.AsylumResearch.com/News/BioClassRegistration.pdf. Posted Dec 17, 2009 Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Calorie Intake Linked To Cell Lifespan, Cancer Development - Redorbit.com Posted: 18 Dec 2009 07:15 AM PST Posted on: Friday, 18 December 2009, 09:15 CST | Related Video Researchers from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) have discovered that restricting consumption of glucose, the most common dietary sugar, can extend the life of healthy human-lung cells and speed the death of precancerous human-lung cells, reducing cancer's spread and growth rate. The research has wide-ranging potential in age-related science, including ways in which calorie-intake restriction can benefit longevity and help prevent diseases like cancer that have been linked to aging, said principal investigator Trygve Tollefsbol, Ph.D., D.O., a professor in the Department of Biology. "These results further verify the potential health benefits of controlling calorie intake." Tollefsbol said. "Our research indicates that calorie reduction extends the lifespan of healthy human cells and aids the body's natural ability to kill off cancer-forming cells." The UAB team conducted its tests by growing both healthy human-lung cells and precancerous human-lung cells in laboratory flasks. The flasks were provided either normal levels of glucose or significantly reduced amounts of the sugar compound, and the cells then were allowed to grow for a period of weeks. "In that time, we were able to track the cells' ability to divide while also monitoring the number of surviving cells. The pattern that was revealed to us showed that restricted glucose levels led the healthy cells to grow longer than is typical and caused the precancerous cells to die off in large numbers," Tollefsbol said. In particular, the researchers found that two key genes were affected in the cellular response to decreased glucose consumption. The first gene, telomerase, encodes an important enzyme that allows cells to divide indefinitely. The second gene, p16, encodes a well known anti-cancer protein. "Opposite effects were found for these genes in healthy cells versus precancerous cells. The healthy cells saw their telomerase rise and p16 decrease, which would explain the boost in healthy cell growth," Tollefsbol said. "The gene reactions flipped in the precancerous cells with telomerase decreasing and the anti-cancer protein p16 increasing, which would explain why these cancer-forming cells died off in large numbers." The UAB research into the links between calorie intake, aging and the onset of diseases related to aging is thought to be a first of its kind given that it used the unique approach of testing human cells versus laboratory animals. "Our results not only support previous findings from the feeding of animals but also reveal that human longevity can be achieved at the cellular level through caloric restriction," Tollefsbol said. "The hope is that this UAB breakthrough will lead to further discoveries in different cell types and facilitate the development of novel approaches to extend the lifespan of humans," he added. Tollefsbol's research team included Yuanyuan Li, Ph.D., M.D., a UAB biology research associate, and Liang Liu, Ph.D., a UAB assistant professor of medicine. The group's study titled "Glucose Restriction Can Extend Normal Cell Lifespan and Impair Precancerous Cell Growth Through Epigenetic Control of hTERT and p16 Expression" has been published in the online edition of The Journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, or FASEB Journal. The research was funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Glenn Foundation for Medical Research. --- Image 2: UAB Research Associate Yuanyuan Li, Ph.d., M.D., works in her biology laboratory. Credit: Jamie Cottle/UAB --- On the Net: Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| British scientists genetic breakthrough brings new hopes for cancer ... - English_Xinhua Posted: 18 Dec 2009 06:25 AM PST by Peter Barker LONDON, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- There were fresh hopes on Thursday of beating cancer with the news that two British scientists had identified the genetic code of two of the most deadly cancers. The breakthrough could mean a revolution in cancer treatment with the possibility that each cancer patient's treatment could be personalized, with the pattern of mutations being used to tailor an individual treatment for each person. The feat, the comprehensive analysis of two cancer genomes (the hereditary information which is encoded in DNA), is a world first and is a revolutionary breakthrough. All cancers are caused by mutations in the DNA of cancer cells which are acquired during a person's lifetime. The studies, of a malignant melanoma and a lung cancer, reveal for the first time essentially all the mutations in the genomes of two cancers. Lung cancer causes around 1 million deaths worldwide each year: almost all are associated with smoking. The number of mutations found suggest that a typical smoker would acquire one mutation for every 15 cigarettes smoked. Although malignant melanoma comprises only 3 percent of skin cancer cases, it is the cause of three out of four skin cancer deaths. The melanoma genome contained more than 30,000 mutations that carried a record of how and when they occurred during the patient's life. The scientists studied the cancers in two patients. The first was a man, aged 55, with small cell lung cancer and the second, a 45-year-old man with a malignant melanoma, a type of skin cancer. The results were published in the scientific journal Nature. Scientists used genetic sequencing machines to read the full genomes of both the cancer cells and healthy tissues. Professor Mike Stratton, from the Cancer Genome Project at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute near Cambridge in Eastern England, led the research team. "These are the two main cancers in the developed world for which we know the primary exposure," said Stratton. For lung cancer, it is cigarette smoke and for malignant melanoma it is exposure to sunlight. With these genome sequences, we have been able to explore deep into the past of each tumor, uncovering with remarkable clarity the imprints of these environmental mutagens on DNA, which occurred years before the tumor became apparent. "We can also see the desperate attempts of our genome to defend itself against the damage wreaked by the chemicals in cigarette smoke or the damage from ultraviolet radiation. Our cells fight back furiously to repair the damage, but frequently lose that fight." The studies used powerful new DNA sequencing technologies to decode completely the genome of both tumor tissue and normal tissue from a lung cancer and a malignant melanoma patient. By comparing the genome sequence from the cancer to the genome from healthy tissue they could pick up the changes specific to the cancer. The studies are the first to produce comprehensive genome-wide descriptions of all classes of mutation, producing rich accounts of the genetic changes in the development of the two cancers. Dr Peter Campbell from the institute said: "The knowledge we extract over the next few years will have major implications for treatment. By identifying all the cancer genes we will be able to develop new drugs that target the specific mutated genes and work out which patients will benefit from these novel treatments." Sir Mark Walport, director of the Wellcome Trust said: "We want to drive healthcare through better understanding of the biology of disease. "Previous outcomes from our Cancer Genome Project are already being fed into clinical trials, and these remarkable new studies further emphasize the extraordinary scientific insights and benefits for patients that accrue from studying the genome of cancer cells. "This is the first glimpse of the future of cancer medicine, not only in the laboratory, but eventually in the clinic. The findings from today will feed into knowledge, methods and practice in patient care." Stratton is deputy director of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, where he is joint head of the Cancer Genome Project. He is also professor of Cancer Genetics at the Institute of Cancer Research. He qualified in medicine at Oxford University and Guys Hospitalin London, trained as a histopathologist at the Hammersmith and Maudsley Hospitals, also in London, and obtained a PhD in the molecular biology of cancer at the Institute of Cancer Research. His research interests have been in the genetics of cancer. He led the group that mapped and identified the high risk breast cancer susceptibility gene, BRCA2. More recently he has found moderate risk breast cancer susceptibility genes as well as genes for skin, testis, colorectal, thyroid, and childhood cancers. At the Cancer Genome Project he conducts high throughput, systematic genome wide searches for somatic mutations in human cancer in order to identify new cancer genes, to understand processes of mutagenesis in human cancers and to reveal the role of genome structure in determining abnormalities of cancer genomes. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, Britain's national academy of science, in 2008. The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is a leader in the 12-year Human genome project, and has built on its sequencing skills to develop new programs in postgenomic biology -- understanding the messages in genes. The institute aims to maintain a position at the forefront of experimental and computational genome research. The institute's research projects fall into four main areas of research -- human genetics, mouse and zebrafish genetics, pathogengenetics and bioinformatics. The institute was founded in 1993, and has taken part in some of the most important advances in genomic research, developing new understanding of genomes and their role in biology. Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Scientists use light to map neurones' effects on one another - Science Centric Posted: 18 Dec 2009 05:35 AM PST Scientists at Harvard University have used light and genetic trickery to trace out neurones' ability to excite or inhibit one another, literally shedding new light on the question of how neurones interact with one another in live animals. The work is described in the current issue of the journal Nature Methods. It builds upon scientists' understanding of the neural circuitry of the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans, frequently used as a model in biological research. While the detailed physical structure of C. elegans' scant 302 neurones is well documented, the new research helps measure how neurones in this organism affect each others' activity, and could ultimately help researchers map out in detail how neural impulses flow throughout the organism. 'This approach gives us a powerful new tool for analysing small neural circuits, and directly measuring how neurones talk to each other,' says Sharad Ramanathan, an assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology and of applied physics at Harvard. 'While we've only mapped out the interplay of four neurones, it's the first time scientists have determined the ability of multiple neurones in a circuit to excite or inhibit their neighbours.' Zengcai Guo and Ramanathan combined genetically encoded calcium sensors and light-activated ion channels with optics. The scientists used a mirror array to excite individual neurones - each just two to three millionths of a metre wide - while simultaneously measuring calcium activity in multiple other neurones. This calcium activity serves to indicate whether these other neurones were activated or inhibited by the neurone that was primed with a burst of light. 'Using this technique, for the first time, we could excite both a sensory neurone and an interneurone and monitor how activity propagates,' says Guo, a research assistant in Harvard's Centre for Systems Biology, Department of Molecular Biology, and School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. 'We expect that our technique can eventually be used more broadly to measure how activity propagates through neural circuits.' Manipulating neurones with light, Guo and Ramanathan were able to evoke an avoidance response - causing the worm to back away from light - that is normally prompted only when the organism is touched. With a compact nervous system consisting of only 302 neurones linked by some 7,000 synapses, the nematode C. elegans is an ideal system for studying the interplay between neural circuits and behaviour. While the physical connectivity of the neurones in this nematode is well known, scientists know very little about which of these connections are excitatory and which are inhibitory. Because of the small sizes of the neurones and a tough cuticle surrounding the worm, electrophysiological recordings can be made from only one neurone at a time, precluding the possibility of any circuit-level analysis of neural activity. By establishing this first fully genetically encoded light-based electrophysiology, the authors have developed a way to overcome this limitation. Source: Harvard UniversityFive Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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