Cx43 Reduces Melanoma Growth Within a Keratinocyte Microenvironment and During Tumorigenesis in vivo

Connexins have been frequently identified as tumor suppressors in many cancers, however, their role in melanoma tumorigenesis remains controversial. Here, we show that B16-BL6 mouse melanoma cells express low levels of Cx26 and Cx43, rendering them gap junctional intercellular communication (GJIC) deficient. Following ectopic expression of Cx26 and Cx43, gap junction-like plaques were evident at the cell surface and the incidence of dye transfer was significantly increased similar to connexin-rich keratinocytes. The expression of Cx43, but not Cx26, significantly reduced proliferation and anchorage-independent growth relative to controls, whereas migration was unaffected. Additionally, Cx43-expressing melanoma cells displayed significantly reduced growth amongst keratinocytes, despite a complete lack of heterocellular GJIC. Furthermore, when grown in vivo in the chicken embryo, Cx43-expressing melanoma cells formed significantly smaller primary tumors compared to controls, whereas Cx26 expression did not alter primary tumor size. Collectively, these results suggest that Cx43, but not Cx26, acts as a tumor suppressor during melanoma tumorigenesis

Creating a Time and Space for SoTL: Faculty Learning Communities

Time is a precious commodity for faculty members who must balance their teaching, scholarship and service commitments to their institution. Faculty often site that they have little time to focus on developing, analyzing, evaluating and/or disseminating their teaching pedagogy. Faculty Learning Communities (FLC) provide a time and space for cross-disciplinary colleagues (6-12 members) to share their expertise, interests and challenges as it relates to teaching and learning with the goal of improving student learning. Such scholarship can evolve through such a time and place when exploration, reflection, analysis and problem-solving emerge through collaboration and networking. Student Learning Communities and Collaborative Learning Communities (faculty, staff and students) can also enhance the value of teaching and learning across the campus. Participants will share their own rewards and challenges of FLC\u27s, develop a plan to create/revise FLC and experience a mini-FLC simulation

Exemplary Teaching Practices across Educational Contexts (P-20+): Unifying Principles and an Ecological Model for Teaching for All to Learn

This paper demonstrates that teaching for all to learn is a central theme of exemplary practice across all educational contexts from preschool through graduate school (P-20+). Ten unifying principles will be presented based on this theme. Although these principles are consistent across P-20+ settings, the ways in which these practices are implemented will differ, depending on the context. An ecological model for teaching for all to learn will be developed, presenting a conceptual schema of the components and factors involved in exemplary teaching across all contexts from P-12 through higher education settings