The Prospects of Organic Agriculture Development in the Chosen Regions of Poland – Podkarpacie and Kurpie

Organic farming is developing dynamically in the European Union. In Poland its growth is dynamic but still not on a wide scale. The area of organic farms has just exceeded 1%. Research shows that the main obstacles of the dynamic development of organic farming are lack of properly educated young farmers, lack of efficient distribution system of organic products in Poland and abroad and a lot of small farms of low productivity

Identification of SVA-Mediated 3’ and 5’ Transductions in Human Genome Sequences

Transposable elements (TEs) are sequences of DNA that can move, or transpose, within a genome. Retrotransposons are TEs that propagate via a “copy and paste” mechanism where the elements are transposed to a new genomic location via an RNA intermediate. Short interspersed element (SINE)-VNTR-Alu elements (SVAs) are non-autonomous retrotransposons that use long interspersed element 1 proteins to mobilize. SVAs are currently active in the human genome and often are characterized by the mobilization of sequences adjacent to the 3’ and 5’ ends of insertions, known as transduction events (TDs). TDs were a focus of this study due to their contribution to genome expansion, exon shuffling, and gene duplication. We analyzed 547 SVA elements across 35 genetically diverse individuals from the Human Genome Structural Variation Consortium. We identified 187 full-length elements, 12 of which carried 3’ TDs, 13 harbored 5’ TDs, and five held both 3’ and 5’ TDs. Four TDs contained exons of genes, including HGSNAT, UQCRC1, and RP11-137H2.4. Utilizing TDs, we screened the dataset for source elements, i.e., active TEs capable of producing offspring, by querying the human reference genome (GRCh38) using BLAT to identify the origin of the TDs and SVA source elements. We found that Chromosomes 3, 10, and 11 showed enrichment for active SVA elements. Novel TDs were identified and can be used to study genome expansion due to their ability to take additional sequences from each genomic location. Source elements can cause insertions that drive disease and genome expansion, exemplifying their significance

Action Research: A Narrative Inquiry Approach to Addressing Student Retention in Undergraduate Science Courses

Research Question: How can the academic success of undergraduate students in science courses at a small, private, health care institution be improved? Sub Question 1: Is there a difference in academic success in science courses between students who use support systems and students who do not use support systems? Sub Question 2: Does a positive academic advising experience improve student retention in science courses?https://ecommons.udayton.edu/grad_showcase/1014/thumbnail.jp

Interdisciplinary Teaching in the Field of Resilient Energy Systems: Experiences with Expert Lecture Series Combined with Workshops

The increased complexity of renewable energy systems derives in uncertain and vulnerable systems behavior, making necessary for energy experts to understand and apply resilience studies with interdisciplinary approaches. With this aim, we have designed a postgraduate course on resilience of energy systems, pursuing an “exchange interdisciplinarity” level that enables students to (i) become aware of competing approaches in terms of methods and theories stemming from different disciplines, and (ii) to critically argue on the suitability of presented concepts for energy systems design and management. The course aimed at achieving a sound level of exchange interdisciplinarity as defined in relevant literature. We chose the following specific teaching methods and didactic items to facilitate this aim and address the different challenges of interdisciplinary education identified from the literature: fundamental introduction (FI), expert interviews and deepening workshops. The FI aimed at providing a sound common basis for understanding the perspectives and approaches from different disciplines. The expert lecture series exposed students to the broadness of state-of-the-art approaches existing in resilience research for energy systems, while the deepening workshops allowed students to develop a deep and critical appraisal of the disciplinary approaches and their relations. The course impact is evaluated through the standard questionnaire for teaching evaluation from the University of Oldenburg. The evaluation shows that the course fostered a critical and interdisciplinary thinking, with a high and interactive participation through the use of multiple didactic measures. This is supported by the high satisfaction of the students, the high level of engagement and academic performance and the qualitative perception from the lecturers. Topics of similar complexity or interdisciplinarity in energy higher education, such as sustainability, technology assessment or energy systems analysis could also benefit from such a course design