Student Name: Sonja Soo
UBC ID:75829093
BIOL463 Week: 3
WEEK 3 LEARNING JOURNAL: YOUR PROGRESS
Before you fill out this document, please review the feedback you received from your previous learning journal piece. Make sure you
address at least one piece of that feedback in this piece either in the table (if appropriate) or using the space in Q3 on the next page.
Factual knowledge
Concepts and connections
Skills
“Facts” that you did not
Links among facts and ideas, applications,
Tasks that you are getting better at
know/understand and that
implications, and general principles that
accomplishing, practical tips and
you now know/understand
have become apparent to you
tricks that you are picking up
Brief description of one or I learned that an
That we cannot infer too much from
I am getting better at reading
two new pieces of
experimental approach to
experimental results. For example, seeing scientific papers efficiently. The key
knowledge or skills
finding enhancers is to use
a correlation between mutation in a
is to look for the main points and
developed since your last an “enhancer trap” where
specific region of DNA and a mutant
summarize along the way; don’t
Learning Journal form.
we insert a reporter
phenotype is only a correlation; causation focus too much on the
construct and look at gene
can’t be concluded from the information
details/names, knowing that those
expression.
presented.
can be referenced in the future.
Activities, media and
In class discussions and
In class discussions and after-class
Assigned readings and practice.
resources (in and out of
background information in
questions with instructor.
class) that you used to
the assigned readings.
develop this
knowledge/skills
This is useful when
This knowledge helps me understand how This skill is useful when
How is this knowledge
understanding
to interpret experimental data from
encountering many readings. I can
useful/helpful/applicable? experimental techniques
scientific papers or experiments;
read more quickly and see the big
What can/will you do with when reading scientific
additionally, this will help me when I do
picture of the experiment rather
it?
article and helps me
my own research, that I can’t make
than getting caught up in details.
understand how scientists
assumptions and based on small sets of
This will help me when I do research
design experiments.
data and infer causation from correlation. either as part of a literature review.
How do you know that
I can explain enhancer trap I can adequately interpret data without
I read the 3 assigned readings in a
you have acquired this
in a simplistic diagram
inferring too much so that I can read
few hours and understood the
knowledge/developed
(attached #1)
results of scientific papers without making concepts. I took notes of the main
this skill? (Please describe
assumptions (attached #2)
points of the papers (attached#3).
or refer to, and attach
evidence).
Student Name: Sonja Soo
UBC ID:75829093
BIOL463 Week: 3
1. Current level of mastery at this point in the course
For each skill or task (a-g), please circle the number that corresponds to your current level of mastery and confidence.
1= To do this I would need someone to
2= To do this I would need 3= To do this I would need
4= To do this I would need
show me how and to provide
considerable supervision
some supervision or
minimal supervision or
considerable assistance
or assistance
assistance
assistance
5= I could do
this on my own
a. Identify and extract relevant information from primary and secondary literature to learn about a topic of interest.
1 2 3 4 5
b. Develop a sensible, testable hypothesis that is based on logic and evidence, and that explains a data set or a phenomenon.
1 2 3 4 5
c. Design a scientific experiment to test a hypothesis relating to developmental biology.
1 2 3 4 5
d. Interpret primary data relative to a biology experiment on the spot.
1 2 3 4 5
e. Develop a relevant and novelscientific question that can be investigated and answered experimentally.
1 2 3 4 5
f. Teach someone else a biological concept, principle, technique, or novel finding and its relevance.
1 2 3 4 5
g. (Skill that you included in your first LJ form) _efficiently read scientific articles______________________________
____________________________________________________________________________.
1 2 3 4 5
2. Addressing one piece of feedback from your first LJ form.
Please use this space to address one piece of feedback that you received on your first Learning Journal form.
-
Q: Factual knowledge that you expect to acquire.
A: Specific information about transcription factors and how they work
Q: What kind of info are you really interested in?
A: I am interested in the Hox genes and how they work to set up the positional pattern in Drosophila. I am fascinated at its conserved order in
the genes that corresponds to the physical body patterning (“colinearity of hox genes”). I think it will be interesting to study what types of Hox
genes work at which time and their specific mechanisms.
3. Difficult and confusing points
Student Name: Sonja Soo
UBC ID:75829093
BIOL463 Week: 3
a. What is one thing that you are still confused about and you would want to have clarified?
I am still confused at how some sequences can be enhancers in some cell types but silencers in other cell types. I know that each cell types has
different proteins and constituents involved and thus do not express the same genes. It does make sense that some genes need to be
expressed in some cells and repressed in others. However, I don’t understand how this can work mechanistically given that DNA sequences are
specific and thus there would be two types of proteins that bind to this sequence, and in one cell type this would be a repressor protein and in
another it would be a transcription factor?
b. How do you think having this point/ “thing” clarified would help you? What would you do with it? How would you use it?
Knowing this would help me gain a deeper understanding of distal regulatory elements and how different cells can be different despite
originating from one cell. This knowledge will help me understand how proteins interact with enhancers and silencers to give different cell
profiles.
Evidence
Student Name: Sonja Soo
#1
UBC ID:75829093
BIOL463 Week: 3
Student Name: Sonja Soo
UBC ID:75829093
BIOL463 Week: 3
#2 http://iospress.metapress.com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/content/d1364719574r7776/fulltext.pdf
I read this paper “CNP and DPYSL2 mRNA Expression and Promoter Methylation Levels in Brain of
Alzheimer’s Disease Patients” where the researchers found CNP and DPYSL2 mRNA in deceased Alzheimer’s Disease Patients. From
the skills I have learned about data interpretation, I know that just because there is a correlation between these proteins expressed
in higher amounts in Alzheimer’s patients, does not necessarily mean these proteins cause Alzheimer ’s disease; it is possible that
having Alzheimer’s Disease causes these genes to have higher expression, or a third variable causing both higher amounts of CNP
and DPYSL2 as well as Alzheimer’s disease.
#3
Student Name: Sonja Soo
UBC ID:75829093
BIOL463 Week: 3