Helping Students Explore the Cartesian Coordinate System

This paper explores a problem-based approach to developing the Cartesian coordinate system as a set of whole number, integer, and rational number ordered pairs. We share our approach, discuss student work, and outline a sequence of problems and key conversations for classroom discussion that we have used with this approach

The Processes and Products of Students' Generalizing Activity

Generalization has been a major focus of curriculum standards and research efforts in mathematics education. While researchers have documented many productive contexts for generalizing and the generalizations students make, less attention has been given to the processes of generalizing. Moreover, there has been less work done with high school students in advanced mathematical contexts. To address these issues we use a model of learning that enables us to make explicit the processes of generalizing. We exemplify this model of learning in the context of an interview study with high school students working on cubic relationships

Ubiquitination of HTLV-I Tax in response to DNA damage regulates nuclear complex formation and nuclear export

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licens

Nutritional status and weakness following pediatric hematopoietic cell transplantation

Survivorship after pediatric HCT has increased over the past decade. Focus on long‐term care and well‐being remains critical due to risk of poor dietary habits and exaggerated sedentary behavior, which can lead to muscle weakness, increased risk for obesity, and cardiometabolic disorders. Nutrition and physical activity are key factors in survivorship; however, data are limited. Comprehensive nutritional assessments, including nutrition‐focused physical examination, grip strength, and food/activity surveys, were completed in 36 pediatric HCT survivors (aged 2‐25 years). Patients were divided into undernutrition, normal‐nutrition, and overnutrition categories. Fifty percent of participants were classified as normal nutrition, 22% undernutrition, and 28% overnutrition. Few patients met the U.S. Dietary Guidelines recommended intake for vegetables, fiber, saturated fat, and So FAS. Patients in the undernutrition group demonstrated significantly lower grip strength than those in the normal‐ and overnutrition groups. When grip strength was normalized to body mass, patients in the overnutrition group had the highest prevalence of weakness. Using NHANES reference data, maximum grip strength and NGS cutoffs were identified that could significantly distinguish the nutrition groups. Comprehensive nutritional assessments and grip strength measurements are feasible, non‐invasive, easy to perform, and inform both under‐ and overnutrition in pediatric HCT survivors.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/134922/1/petr12821.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/134922/2/petr12821_am.pd

Another breast cancer entity confirmed: Genomics of invasive lobular breast cancer

Invasive lobular carcinoma (ILC) accounts for up to 15% of all invasive breast cancers. We have long recognized the unique clinical characteristics of ILC, but an increased understanding of its biology in contrast with the more common breast cancer histologic type, infiltrating ductal carcinoma (IDC), has emerged. The article that accompanies this editorial by Desmedt et al reinforces and extends this understanding

TGFBR3 (transforming growth factor, beta receptor III)

Review on TGFBR3 (transforming growth factor, beta receptor III), with data on DNA, on the protein encoded, and where the gene is implicated

Amplification of SOX4 promotes PI3K/Akt signaling in human breast cancer

Purpose: The PI3K/Akt signaling axis contributes to the dysregulation of many dominant features in breast cancer including cell proliferation, survival, metabolism, motility, and genomic instability. While multiple studies have demonstrated that basal-like or triple-negative breast tumors have uniformly high PI3K/Akt activity, genomic alterations that mediate dysregulation of this pathway in this subset of highly aggressive breast tumors remain to be determined. Methods: In this study, we present an integrated genomic analysis based on the use of a PI3K gene expression signature as a framework to analyze orthogonal genomic data from human breast tumors, including RNA expression, DNA copy number alterations, and protein expression. In combination with data from a genome-wide RNA-mediated interference screen in human breast cancer cell lines, we identified essential genetic drivers of PI3K/Akt signaling. Results: Our in silico analyses identified SOX4 amplification as a novel modulator of PI3K/Akt signaling in breast cancers and in vitro studies confirmed its role in regulating Akt phosphorylation. Conclusions: Taken together, these data establish a role for SOX4-mediated PI3K/Akt signaling in breast cancer and suggest that SOX4 may represent a novel therapeutic target and/or biomarker for current PI3K family therapies

Adjuvant IL-15 does not enhance the efficacy of tumor cell lysate-pulsed dendritic cell vaccines for active immunotherapy of T cell lymphoma

There has been a recent interest in using IL-15 to enhance antitumor activity in several models because of its ability to stimulate CD8 + T cell expansion, inhibit apoptosis and promote memory T cell survival and maintenance. Previously, we reported that C6VL tumor lysate-pulsed dendritic cell vaccines significantly enhanced the survival of tumor-bearing mice by stimulating a potent tumor-specific CD8 + T cell response. In this study, we determined whether IL-15 used as immunologic adjuvant would augment vaccine-primed CD8 + T cell immunity against C6VL and further improve the survival of tumor-bearing mice. We report that IL-15 given after C6VL lysate-pulsed dendritic cell vaccines stimulated local and systemic expansion of NK, NKT and CD8 + CD44 hi T cells. IL-15 did not, however, augment innate or cellular responses against the tumor. T cells from mice infused with IL-15 following vaccination did not secrete increased levels of tumor-specific TNF-α or IFN-γ or have enhanced C6VL-specific CTL activity compared to T cells from recipients of the vaccine alone. Lastly, IL-15 did not enhance the survival of tumor-bearing vaccinated mice. Thus, while activated- and memory-phenotype CD8 + T cells were dramatically expanded by IL-15 infusion, vaccine-primed CD8 + T cell specific for C6VL were not significantly expanded. This is the first account of using IL-15 as an adjuvant in a therapeutic model of active immunotherapy where there was not a preexisting pool of tumor-specific CD8 + T cells. Our results contrast the recent studies where IL-15 was successfully used to augment tumor-reactivity of adoptively transferred transgenic CD8 + T cells. This suggests that the adjuvant potential of IL-15 may be greatest in settings where it can augment the number and activity of preexisting tumor-specific CD8 + T cells.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/46865/1/262_2005_Article_6.pd