The Concept of Hygiene of Primary School Students in the Scope of Social Studies Teaching

The aim of this study is to determine the perceptions of Turkish Cypriot students about "hygiene", which is an important subject in the learning field of My Health, within the scope of Life Studies (1st, 2nd and 3rd Grade) course in primary schools. It is to evaluate and offer suggestions according to the situation that will arise. In this context, the study group of the research consists of 4th grade students in the 2019-2020 academic year whose Life Studies program has been completed. This study has been carried out using the phenomenological research design, one of the qualitative research designs. The sample of this study was formed using the convenience sampling method. Accordingly, a total of 185 4th grade students enrolled in the elementary schools located in TRNC comprised the study sample. Of these students, 107, 47 and 31 students were enrolled in the elementary schools located in Kyrenia, Nicosia and Morfou districts of TRNC, respectively. Content analysis of the answers given by the 185 students revealed that students used a total of 58 valid metaphors for the concept of “Hygiene” in different frequencies. These 58 metaphors were categorized into 8 themes of Cleaning, Cleaning Materials, Living Things, Family, Health, Non-Living Things, Abstract Things and Germs. Students were found to have used cleaning (f=65) the most, followed by broom (f=9), mother (f=8), white (f=8), water (f=8) and medication (f=6), as the metaphors to explain their hygiene perceptions. A review of the frequencies of the metaphors put forward by the students regarding the theme of family within the scope of this study gave rise to the question of whether there are sufficient role models in terms of hygiene in students’ environments, within their families in particular. Further studies are needed to find an aswer to this question

DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION OF A DRIED BLOOD SPOT LC-MS/MS ASSAY TO QUANTIFY GEMCITABINE IN HUMAN WHOLE BLOOD: A COMPARISION WITH AND WITHOUT CYTIDINE DEAMINASE INHIBITOR

Objective: The purpose of this paper is to develop and validate a LC-MS/MS method for the quantification of gemcitabine in whole human blood using dried blood spots.Methods: Gemcitabine fortified blood samples without tetrahydrouridine were spotted (50 µl) onto the DBS cards and dried for 2h at ambient room temperature. 3 mm punched spots were extracted by acetonitrile: water (90:10v/v) containing carbamazepine as internal standard (IS). Analyte and IS were separated on BDS Hypersil C18,(100 X 4.6 mm, 5 µ) column using a mixture of methanol and 2 mM ammonium acetate buffer (65:35 v/v) at a flow rate of 0.5 mL/min. Detection involved API-4000 LC-MS/MS with electrospray ionization in the positive ion mode.Results: The assay was validated over the concentration range of 5-5000 ng/ml. Intra and inters assay precision values (% CV) were less than 6.0% while the accuracy was within±15%. The mean recovery (%CV) of gemcitabine from DBS was ≥83.5% (≤4.0). Hematocrit values ranging between 0.25 and 0.62 were within acceptable limit with accuracy 93.0-103.1% of nominal values and %CV of ≤6.5 across the LQC and HQC levels. Gemcitabine was stable on DBS cards for atleast 90days at room temperature.Conclusions: A cytidine drug like gemcitabine exhibits ex vivo instability and rapidly converts to inactive metabolite in blood. All current published methods for stabilisation include tetrahydrouridine a cytidine deaminase inhibitor in the sample collection tubes. The proposed DBS method can be used as an alternative assay to conventional plasma analysis without adding enzyme inhibitor.Â

Investıgation of Academic Self-Efficacy of Unıversity Students In Terms Of Various Variables

Bu çalışmada, aday sınıf öğretmenlerinin, akademik öz-yeterliklerinin çeşitli değişkenler açısından incelenmesi ele alınmıştır. Araştırma 416 katılımcı ile gerçekleştirilmiştir. Araştırmada Akademik ÖzYeterlik Ölçeği kullanılmıştır. Veri toplama araçları ile elde edilen veriler Mann Whitney U ve Kruskall Wallis H testi ile analiz edilmişitir. Ayrıca araştırmada elde edilen alt boyutlar arasındaki ilişkiyi belirlemek amacıyla korelasyon analizi yapılmıştır. Sonuçlara bakıldığında Akademik öz-yeterlik ölçeğinin alt boyutlarında erkek aday sınıf öğretmenleri lehine anlamlı farklılıklar olduğu tespit edilmiştir. Sınıf düzeyinde ise girişkenlik boyutunda birinci sınıfta öğrenim görmekte olan öğrencilerin aleyhinde bir ilişki ortaya çıkmıştır ve anlama boyutunda ise birinci sınıfların lehine bir ilişki tespit edilmiştir. Korelasyon analizi sonucu ise anlama ve çalışma boyutları arasında yüksek bir ilişki tespit edilmiştir. Bu sonuçlardan hareketle, birinci sınıfta öğrenim görmekte olanların üst sınıflarda öğrenim görmekte olanlardan daha az girişken olması, birinci sınıfların üniversite, sınıf, yeni arkadaşlar, yeni öğretim üyeleri vb. etmenlere bağlı olan oryantasyon eksikliğinden kaynaklandığını ve büyükşehirlerde öğrenim görmenin akademik öz yeterliğe olumlu yönde etki ettiğini söyleyebiliriz. Ayrıca akademik öz-yeterlik alt boyutları arasındaki ilişkinin yönünün tüm boyutlarda pozitif ve anlamlı olduğunun belirlenmesi, akademik öz yeterliliğin bir çok boyutla ele alınması gerektiğini göstermektedir.In this study, the Prospective Classroom Teachers' academic self-efficacy had been considered in terms of examining different variables. The Research had a total number of 416 participants. In the Research, The Academic Self-Efficacy Scale was used. The datas obtained with data collection instruments were analyzed by Mann Whitney U test and Kruskall Wallis H test. Moreover, in order to determine the relationship between the subscales obtained in research correlation analyses was performed. Considering the results of academic self- efficacy qualification scale in subscales, the male prospective classroom teachers had a significant difference. The level of being sociable in the class level came out against the first year studying students and the size of comprehension was determined in favor of the first year studying students. The result of correlation analysis detected a high correlation between comprehension and study sizes. From these results in mind, first year students are less sociable than those studying in upper classes. This is due to lack of orientation which depends on several factors like university, class, new friends, new faculty and so on and we can say that a positive effect on academic self-efficacy of studying in metropolitan cities. In addition, all of the aspects of the relationship between academic self-efficacy subscales in all dimensions are determined to be positive and significant, it suggests that academic self-efficacy should be addressed in a multidimensional

Breast Cancer and Flavonoids as Treatment Strategy

Breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer type among women. Despite recent progress in early detection and therapeutic strategies, the rate of mortality is increasing. Anti-estrogens or aromatase inhibitors are preferred to treat the women diagnosed with estrogen-receptor (ER) positive tumors. However, breast tumors usually show intra-tumoral heterogeneity with ER-positive and -negative cells. The advanced breast cancer cells lose the estrogen responsiveness and become aggressive by developing new strategies for rapid proliferation such as mutations in cell cycle machinery. New promising drugs are still being investigating against these types of tumors especially to overcome acquired resistance against chemotherapeutic drugs; however, a successful treatment for metastatic tumors is still unclear. Flavonoids, with various pharmacological activities, are plant or fungus secondary metabolites present in human diet. In plants, beside their role in pigmentation, they may also act as messengers, regulators and cell cycle inhibitors. Therefore, they are being tested in ovarian, cervical as well as breast cancer. Due to the positive correlation between flavonoids-rich diet and lower risk of cancer, flavonoids are referred as chemopreventive agents. The current chapter emphasizes the therapeutic potential of flavonoids and their synthetic analogues as anti-cancer agents in breast cancer providing new insights into the molecular mechanisms

Perceptions Of Primary School Students Towards The Concept Of Peace

In general, peace is considered to be the absence of hostility. Peace is so much of an important phenomenon that requires its teaching to be regulated. Instilling concept of peace in the individuals is one of the essential goals of every education system, which is done gradually in each level of education starting from basic education. It would be useful to make a situation assessment before deciding what and how to teach in education, and this can be done through the use of metaphors. Metaphors are one of the basic mental models that shape people's thoughts about the reality and the world. Metaphors allow the children to create their own perceptions and make sense of the situation or the event they encounter. The aim of this study is to investigate the perceptions of elementary school students about the concept of “peace” through metaphor analysis. The study group of the research consists of second and third grade elementary school students. 41 of these students were Turkey, 54 students were from TRNC, and 22 these students were from Syria. The research data were collected from these students by asking them to express their opinions through filling in the missing parts of sentences included in the questionnaire form. These sentences were prepared in the following format: “I compare peace to ………. . Because ….... ."In this way, the students were required to use a metaphor to fill in the first blank and to explain their reasoning in choosing that metaphor in the second blank, and their answers were analyzed. A total of 35 valid metaphors for the concept of peace were developed by the 117 elementary school students from three different countries. These metaphors were categorized under five themes, which are; positive metaphors, negative metaphors, metaphors of social value, metaphors of vitality and imaginative metaphors. On the other hand, in terms of the frequencies they were used by the students, metaphors of making peace (f = 24), friendship (f = 10), love (f = 9), motherfather (f = 8), war (f = 7) Ataturk (f = 6), beautifulness (f = 6), and happiness (f = 6) were identified as the metaphors, which were developed by students the most. It was concluded as a result of the study that the students from Syria defined the concept of peace mostly based on interest, that the students from Turkey defined the concept of peace mostly based on friendship, and that the students from TRNC defined the concept of peace mostly based making peace. The differences observed in the answers of students from different countries were due to the different geographical characteristics of these countries as well as the differences in the historical processes these countries have been through

Aging-Related Diseases and Autophagy

Autophagy is fundamental, evolutionary conserved physiological process at molecular level which targets long-lived cytosolic proteins and organelles to be recycled through lysosomal degradation. Diminished autophagic activity caused cellular stress in many organisms following aging, and inhibition of autophagy in model organisms causes degenerative changes and pathologic diseases observed with high incidence ratio generally in older ages. Consequently the delayed senescence or increased longevity in model organisms often stimulate autophagy, and autophagy inhibition compromises anti-aging effects. The cytoprotective function of autophagy is presented in various human diseases such as lung, liver, cardiovascular diseases, neurodegeneration, myopathies, cancer, stroke, infections and metabolic diseases which are found associated with autophagic targets. These pathologies are defined with their age-dependent characteristics, is not fully understood that how autophagy network regulates metabolism and may cause diseases in age-related manner. In this book chapter, we are going to discuss the autophagy and aging relationship in three different parts. In the first section autophagy and aging relationship is going to be presented through explaining responsible signalling network. The autophagy and age-related neurological disorders, genetic basis of age-dependent diseases and the functional role of autophagy is going to be discussed in the second and third part of the chapter

Perspectives of Elementary School Teachers on Outdoor Education

Abstract Outdoor education stands out as one of the methods to deliver the desired educational outcomes taking the needs of the students, teachers and the curricular objectives into consideration. Outdoor education focuses on experimental, hands-on learning in real-life environments through senses, e.g., through visual, auditory, and tactile means, improving students' learning and retention of knowledge as a result. Appropriate sites outside of the classroom and school environment are chosen as the setting for outdoor education. Students are assessed over their performances related to the experiments and applications via observations and reports. Generally speaking, outdoor education is not common in Turkey, whereas in specific, at the elementary level, outdoor education seems to be limited to certain social activities and field trips rendered within the scope of student clubs. As Pedretti [1] et al. concluded in their study, the efficiency of outdoor education depends on the teachers. Based on the said study, teachers should be allowed to collaborate with their colleagues to analyze existing outdoor education programs and develop programs of their own. On the other hand, only teachers that are aware of outdoor education ask for such opportunities from the administrative bodies. Therefore, in this study, Turkish classroom teachers' current awareness and perspectives on outdoor education were assessed via descriptive analysis. The specific study group chosen for the study consisted of the classroom teachers working in Şahinbey County of Gaziantep Province. As for collection of the relevant qualitative data, participants were interviewed using a semi-structured interviewing form

The function of poliamine metabolism in prostate cancer

In many developed countries prostate cancer is the second leading cause of cancer related death in human population. Prostate tissue is characterized by the highest level of polyamines among organs in human body, and it is even higher in prostate carcinomas. These ubiquitous molecules are synthesized by prostate epithelium and are involved in many biochemical processes including cell proliferation, cell cycle regulation and protein synthesis. In this review we made the attempt to discuss the functions of polyamines, their involvement in apoptosis and potential role as molecular biomarker for prostate cancer. Also we present recent data on generation of drugs, in particular, cyclin dependent kinase inhibitor, developed for therapy of prostate cancer.Во многих развитых странах рак предстательной железы занимает первое место как причина смертности вследствие онкологических заболеваний. Ткань предстательной железы характеризуется наиболее высоким уровнем содержания полиаминов в сравнении с другими органами человека, причем в ткани карциномы простаты их содержание еще выше. Эти биомолекулы синтезируются эпителиальными клетками предстательной железы и принимают участие во многих биохимических процессах, включая пролиферацию клеток, регуляцию клеточного цикла и синтез белков. В обзоре обсуждаются функции полиаминов в клетке, их участие в процессах апоптоза и потенциальная роль в качестве биомаркеров при раке предстательной железы. Кроме того, приведены новые данные о разработке препаратов, в частности ингибитора циклинзависимой киназы, предназначенных для лечения рака предстательной железы

In Vitro Investigations of miR-33a Expression in Estrogen Receptor-Targeting Therapies in Breast Cancer Cells

Background: Increased fatty acid synthesis leads to the aggressive phenotype of breast cancer and renders efficiency of therapeutics. Regulatory microRNAs (miRNAs) on lipid biosynthesis pathways as miR-33a have potential to clarify the exact mechanism. (2) Methods: We determined miR-33a expression levels following exposure of MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells to estrogen receptor (ER) activator (estradiol-17β, E2) or anti-estrogens (ICI 182,780, Fulvestrant, FUL) at non-cytotoxic concentrations. We related miR-33a expression levels in the cells to cellular lipid biosynthesis-related pathways through immunoblotting. (3) Results: miR-33a mimic treatment led to significantly downregulation of fatty acid synthase (FASN) in MCF-7 cells but not in MDA-MB-231 cells in the presence of estradiol-17β (E2) or Fulvestrant (FUL). In contrast to the miR-33a inhibitor effect, miR-33a mimic co-transfection with E2 or FUL led to diminished AMP-activated protein kinase α (AMPKα) activity in MCF-7 cells. E2 increases FASN levels in MDA-MB-231 cells regardless of miR-33a cellular levels. miR-33a inhibitor co-treatment suppressed E2-mediated AMPKα activity in MDA-MB-231 cells. (4) Conclusions: The cellular expression levels of miR-33a are critical to understanding differential responses which include cellular energy sensors such as AMPKα activation status in breast cancer cells

Mild folate deficiency induces genetic and epigenetic instability and phenotype changes in prostate cancer cells

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Folate (vitamin B9) is essential for cellular proliferation as it is involved in the biosynthesis of deoxythymidine monophosphate (dTMP) and s-adenosylmethionine (AdoMet). The link between folate depletion and the genesis and progression of cancers of epithelial origin is of high clinical relevance, but still unclear. We recently demonstrated that sensitivity to low folate availability is affected by the rate of polyamine biosynthesis, which is prominent in prostate cells. We, therefore, hypothesized that prostate cells might be highly susceptible to genetic, epigenetic and phenotypic changes consequent to folate restriction.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We studied the consequences of long-term, mild folate depletion in a model comprised of three syngenic cell lines derived from the transgenic adenoma of the mouse prostate (TRAMP) model, recapitulating different stages of prostate cancer; benign, transformed and metastatic. High-performance liquid chromatography analysis demonstrated that mild folate depletion (100 nM) sufficed to induce imbalance in both the nucleotide and AdoMet pools in all prostate cell lines. Random oligonucleotide-primed synthesis (ROPS) revealed a significant increase in uracil misincorporation and DNA single strand breaks, while spectral karyotype analysis (SKY) identified five novel chromosomal rearrangements in cells grown with mild folate depletion. Using global approaches, we identified an increase in CpG island and histone methylation upon folate depletion despite unchanged levels of total 5-methylcytosine, indicating a broad effect of folate depletion on epigenetic regulation. These genomic changes coincided with phenotype changes in the prostate cells including increased anchorage-independent growth and reduced sensitivity to folate depletion.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>This study demonstrates that prostate cells are highly susceptible to genetic and epigenetic changes consequent to mild folate depletion as compared to cells grown with supraphysiological amounts of folate (2 μM) routinely used in tissue culture. In addition, we elucidate for the first time the contribution of these aspects to consequent phenotype changes in epithelial cells. These results provide a strong rationale for studying the effects of folate manipulation on the prostate <it>in vivo</it>, where cells might be more sensitive to changes in folate status resulting from folate supplementation or antifolate therapeutic approaches.</p