WEEK 8 LEARNING JOURNAL

Please try to address these questions to the best of your abilities. If nothing really comes to mind, it is OK to leave one or two questions blank, but please indicate that you are deliberately leaving them blank (so that I can tell that you did not just forget to answer). Please post on your blog by the end of Saturday of week 8 (March 7th).

For simplicity, you can fill in your responses/thoughts in the table below. But first, read the questions carefully (they are different from previous formsJ)

1. Three things that stood out

Please describe, briefly, three things that you learned so far in BIOL463 and that really stood out to you (either because you enjoyed them, found them surprising, found them difficult – any reason).

1. Imprinting was a strange and new concept
2. Insulators and their blocking effects, this is also a new and difficult concept to grasp because we didn’t discuss the details of the mechanism.
3. Hox genes and their regulation by ncRNAs, the mechanism can become very confusing but also interesting.

1. Identify types of knowledge

For each of your three “things”, please try to identify what type of knowledge it represents (Factual, Conceptual, Procedural/Skills, Metacognitive).

1. Conceptual knowledge, because it is a model
2. Conceptual knowledge, because it is a model
3. Conceptual knowledge, because it is a model

1. What makes “things” stand out for you

For each of your three “things”, please indicate what made it stand out for you.

1. It is strange that one copy of the same gene is turned off depending on the parental origin, and it shows me that genetics can become very complex and many things other than the genetics of the offspring can affect it’s phenotype.
2. It is really strange that insulators can “block” parts of the genome from enhancer activity, heterochromatins and position effects. I am curious to learn more about the details of this mechanism because I imagine that they have to somehow bind specific DNA sequences to prevent other molecules from binding that sequence. Previously I was only aware of heterochromatin and its role in turning off certain parts of the genome.
3. This concept stood out because I realized the importance of transcription factors. It is strange that Hox proteins are simply transcription factors, however they can be vital in determining segment identity during development by affecting other genes. Their regulation by ncRNAs, which are simply RNA molecules, is also a very new topic.

1. Evidence (of course, we are in a science course … we like evidence!)

Imagine that you need to test a group of students on one of your three “things”. Imagine that you need to determine, precisely, whether these students have acquired/developed the same knowledge that you have. How would you test them, and what would you consider as evidence that they have developed/acquired this knowledge?