Final Project Reflection

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

The final project assignment was in short… a rollercoaster of science adventure. By the end of the project, I think I changed/refined my question about 20 different times. Each time I read a new paper, my previous plan would change and each new edit would bring a slew of new questions. As described in the outline for the project, the most difficult part of the assignment was coming up with a novel question – this was most definitely true. I am guilty of laughing with classmates about “I  can’t believe they got published researching such a thing!” or “How is that even worth researching?” I don’t think I can ever go back to that way of thinking after this. I never realized the amount of work that comes with coming up with a novel question! One of the most valuable parts of this project to me was seeing how research builds on previous work and how each new discovery adds to the greater human knowledge.

Over the course of working on this project, I had great conversations with some of my peers from other fields such as psychology. As I settled with working on a mouse model for human Alzheimer’s disease, my psychology peers were a great resource in helping me brainstorm creative new angles I could work with for my project. …They were also helpful in calming me down when I continually found my ideas falling apart. 🙂

Why I ended up choosing the project I did was because my grandfather was actually told he may be showing signs of early Alzheimer’s disease pathology. I had always heard of Alzheimer’s disease but never really looked into what it meant, what the symptoms were and the impact that diagnosis could have on patients. Being a Biology major, I took advantage of the UBC Library Database rather than just using Wikipedia to see what scientists were working on in the research field associated with Alzheimer’s disease. As I found myself lost down the rabbit hole of papers, I found various transgenic mouse models being used to study human diseases and thus began the start of my project idea!

By the end of this project, I felt very confident and versed on my project concept. It is a very rewarding feeling to know that I struggled through it and came up with what I think is a very interesting idea! I appreciated the ability to choose a topic that interested is, this really helped keep me going as I read never ending long research papers. As tough as the journey was, I am content with where it took me. 🙂 Some of the learning goals of the course that I think I was able to show were specifically:

Who is science for?

While working on my final project, I asked one of my friends who is studying engineering to edit my final draft. I quickly realized that not much could be done in terms of content because the language of science and the language of engineering are apparently two very different worlds. The edit was still useful because it allowed for an overall grammar check, something both fields share in common is a well-written proposal!

Later while uploading this draft edit onto the blog, I began to wonder – if the general public doesn’t understand science, who is science for? Not many of my close friends are studying science and both my parents studied in the humanities while in college so I rarely talk to people outside of peers in classes I am taking about science. These peers are all coming from a very similar knowledge base as I am so I don’t tend to run into the issue of them not being interested in a paper I read or not understanding some silly science related joke I read on Facebook as I procrastinated my homework. This leads me to the question – how can we make the general public not only interested in science but somewhat well versed in basic scientific concepts? When I mean basic scientific concepts, I mean things like hypothesis, statistically significant or even what the word genetics mean.

Whenever I do hear non-science students talking about science, it is often from something that has blown up in the media such as GMOs. While on co-op I had a placement with Agriculture Agri-Food Canada in Summerland, BC where I was part of a project studying post-harvest physiology of new apple varieties in regards to storage related diseases. When I got back a lot of people were asking – so did you make genetically modified apples? Well technically… yes? We manipulated crosses of apples but we didn’t work in test tubes… we literally broke off a branch of one tree and tied it onto another. I think the media does a great job of confusing the general public by taking one issue and making them think that it works like that across the board. Science is more complex then that.

After all that rambling… I think the solution is for those of us studying science or working in science to talk to people! Talk to your friends over coffee about that cool transgenic mouse model or explain that studying genes isn’t some science fiction field but very practical and important research. I think if those in the field make research and science in general seem more normalized, it can go a long way to develop a critical thinking society. When scientists only talk to other scientists, the field becomes this elusive concept that is away from the general public. Additionally, when presenting information to the general public it is important to be mindful of what media they may have been exposed to and what a certain word means in science may not mean the same for them. So who is science for? Everyone! We just have to make sure we share the knowledge!

Animal Testing

How I feel about animal testing is something that my peers who do not study science ask me quite frequently. As a vegetarian, who is working on becoming a vegan, my friends tend to think that I would be against animal testing. On the other hand, I also study science where I regularly read papers and interact with material that was only possible through animal models and dissections. I think I am a bit on the fence about the issue, without a very strong argument either way – but I tend to lean towards “pro-animal testing”. This is because I think that there are some major benefits. Some main things that come to mind for pro-animal testing:

• Animal testing has been able to lead to life-saving cures and treatments. Without these tests on animals, we would not be able to move forward with our understanding of diseases that ail humans.
• Using animals such as mice is the best way at the current time to be able to compare results to humans. I have seen arguments made for using cells or using plants for research on diseases, but those results though they made aid to the great pool of knowledge around a certain cellular pathway or gene – they are not as directly transferable to humans.
• There are ethical considerations that are put into place when researching with animals. I think some people are under the impression that no thought is given and millions of animals are killed at random. There is a lot of care and thought put into research that uses animals to assure that that is the best approach that should be taken. This is why I actually disagree with some undergraduate studies labs that have dissections. I believe dissections are necessary when learning a specific dissection technique but in my person experience, a lot of the time it is done just for the sake of making things “interesting” – knowledge that could have been gained equally as well from diagrams and/or pictures.

These were just some thoughts floating around in my head about why I think I support animal testing. I think that when I can see a direct purpose in the use of animal testing, it makes sense.

Midterm 2 Reflection

For the second Midterm, I had an oral version instead of the written exam. This was my first time participating in an oral midterm… and it was an interesting experience. I’ve never seen myself as a nervous or particularly “shy” person, but this oral midterm was difficult. I had prepared for the midterm by reading the article several times as well as going through each of the graphs in order to see what I thought they were showing as well as how they related to the major claims of the paper. I felt fairly secure about my understanding of the paper going in.

However going into the oral midterm, I felt very self-conscious about my answers, even if I had concerned that exact question previously putting my thoughts into words became very difficult for some reason. I think in a written type exam you are in your own head, able to turn back and forth from different questions at your own leisure (well with time constraint), but in an oral midterm you are presented with a question and you answer it. Even though I struggled with this type of exam, I’m really glad I chose to do it. I learned that sometimes you may think you know a concept but when you have to sort of explain it to another person orally, your understanding is really tested. Of course, as a student I’ve heard a million times “explain the concept to a peer!” as a tip to studying for an exam. I never really appreciated the level of understanding needed to orally explain a concept before until this midterm.

Overall, I was happy with my grade for this second midterm and, even more, happy with the skills and appreciation I gained in regards to explaining a scientific paper out loud!

N&V Presentation Reflection 

First off, I really enjoyed this assignment! I presented a paper on pulsing transcription factors which are regulatory elements that work in “pulses” by moving in and out of the nucleus in order to regulate their target genes. This is in contrast to regular transcription factors which act continuously in the nucleus. Pulsing transcription factors are able to regulate genes in more complex ways because information like their frequency of pulsing plays a role in the regulation process of the genes they regulate as well as their presence or absence in relation to other transcription regulatory elements in the nucleus. This assignment gave me a new appreciation for the complexity of regulatory elements and made me reflect on the bigger picture of transcription factors in the gene regulation process. Previously, I had a much more static understanding of transcription factors. I just assumed there was a transcription factor –> it bound to target gene –> regulation! – It’s much more complex than that! This aided me in understanding how to approach future examples of regulation – what is is present in the nucleus that is playing a role? Is this transcription factor working in coordination with other elements? This assignment made me look at regulation of genes as a whole interactive picture rather than static parts that work independently.

Another aspect of this assignment which I really enjoyed was creating questions based on what I had learned. Having to think of distractor answers as well as possible outcomes of my own question gave me a deeper understanding of the material as well as what difficulties my classmates could have when they have been presented the material. I enjoyed this aspect so much that I actually made two. 🙂 I’ve attached a copy of my 2nd question (the one I didn’t end up going with for my final assignment).

As for the actual presentation, I thought I did decently well. I definitely appreciated the questions from my peers as it allowed me to better explain what I had learned from the paper. As the time limit was 3 minutes, this was something that worried me and as a result, I think I spoke extremely fast (which is something I tend to do regularly). If I could go back and correct anything about the presentation, I would practice speaking slower!

• Small edit to the question: ” choose the corresponding target gene expression over time graph”

Midterm 1 Reflection

I didn’t do as well as I would have liked on the Midterm to be quite honest. It was a tough week of midterms on top of assignments and I think I wasn’t exactly prepared as well as I would have liked to me. I found it quite challenging not only to decipher the questions but to come up with a concise answer in such a short amount of time. I spent a lot of time on earlier questions, without really looking at how much was expected for later questions (specifically number 5). This lack of thought to time allotment for each question left me scrambling for ideas near the end.

Though I did not have a great experience with the first midterm, I am optimistic when it comes to the second midterm. I think I have a better understanding of what types of answers are expected as well as more experience looking at graphs/tables/diagrams as to understand the information quicker (from the papers we have been reading in lecture). Going into the second midterm, I will be careful to skim over the entire exam and give myself a rough time allotment for each question before beginning. I think this approach will allow me to give each question the appropriate amount of time instead of dwelling on just a few and then rushing through the rest. 🙂