A Journey Toward Mastery Teaching: STEM Faculty Engagement in a Year-Long Faculty Learning Community

As part of an institutional focus on STEM student success, a group of STEM faculty participated in a year-long faculty learning community (FLC) to explore and adopt research-based best practice in their teaching. The authors assessed the effectiveness of the FLC in influencing faculty perceptions about teaching and increasing their use of best teaching practices. Their research design used pre- and post-analysis of participants\u27 teaching logs, classroom observations, and a survey instrument that probed attitudes toward teaching and learning. Data analysis shows that the sustained support provided by the FLC increased faculty knowledge of best teaching practices and catalyzed faculty to try new pedagogical and assessment approaches. However, over the year of the FLC experience, only small shifts were observed in faculty perceptions and practice, as measured by a survey and a descriptive observation protocol, respectively. Results suggest the experience primarily supported modest faculty exploration of new strategies

Numerical simulation of the influence of the orifice aperture on the flow around a teeth-shaped obstacle

The sound generated during the production of the sibilant [s] results from the impact of a turbulent jet on the incisors. Several geometric characteristics of the oral tract can affect the properties of the flow-induced noise so that the characterization of the influence of different geometric parameters on the acoustic sources properties allows determining control factors of the noise production. In this study, a simplified vocal tract/teeth geometric model is used to numerically investigate the flow around a teeth-shaped obstacle placed in a channel and to analyze the influence of the aperture at the teeth on the spectral properties of the fluctuating pressure force exerted on the surface of the obstacle, which is at the origin of the dipole sound source. The results obtained for Re = 4000 suggest that the aperture of the constriction formed by the teeth modifies the characteristics of the turbulent jet downstream of the teeth. Thus, the variations of the flow due to the modification of the constriction aperture lead to variations of the spectral properties of the sound source even if the levels predicted are lower than during the production of real sibilant fricative

Outer-Sphere Contributions to the Electronic Structure of Type Zero Copper Proteins

Bioinorganic canon states that active-site thiolate coordination promotes rapid electron transfer (ET) to and from type 1 copper proteins. In recent work, we have found that copper ET sites in proteins also can be constructed without thiolate ligation (called “type zero” sites). Here we report multifrequency electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR), magnetic circular dichroism (MCD), and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopic data together with density functional theory (DFT) and spectroscopy-oriented configuration interaction (SORCI) calculations for type zero Pseudomonas aeruginosa azurin variants. Wild-type (type 1) and type zero copper centers experience virtually identical ligand fields. Moreover, O-donor covalency is enhanced in type zero centers relative that in the C112D (type 2) protein. At the same time, N-donor covalency is reduced in a similar fashion to type 1 centers. QM/MM and SORCI calculations show that the electronic structures of type zero and type 2 are intimately linked to the orientation and coordination mode of the carboxylate ligand, which in turn is influenced by outer-sphere hydrogen bonding

Speech Communication

Contains reports on two research projects.National Institutes of Health (Grant 2 ROl1 NS04332)National Institutes of Health (Training Grant 5 T32 NS07040)C.J. LeBel FellowshipsNational Science Foundation (Grant BNS77-26871

Gene expression relationship between prostate cancer cells of Gleason 3, 4 and normal epithelial cells as revealed by cell type-specific transcriptomes

Background: Prostate cancer cells in primary tumors have been typed CD10(-)/CD13(-)/CD24(hi)/CD26(+)/CD38(lo)/CD44(-)/CD104(-). This CD phenotype suggests a lineage relationship between cancer cells and luminal cells. The Gleason grade of tumors is a descriptive of tumor glandular differentiation. Higher Gleason scores are associated with treatment failure. Methods: CD26(+) cancer cells were isolated from Gleason 3+3 (G3) and Gleason 4+4 (G4) tumors by cell sorting, and their gene expression or transcriptome was determined by Affymetrix DNA array analysis. Dataset analysis was used to determine gene expression similarities and differences between G3 and G4 as well as to prostate cancer cell lines and histologically normal prostate luminal cells. Results: The G3 and G4 transcriptomes were compared to those of prostatic cell types of non-cancer, which included luminal, basal, stromal fibromuscular, and endothelial. A principal components analysis of the various transcriptome datasets indicated a closer relationship between luminal and G3 than luminal and G4. Dataset comparison also showed that the cancer transcriptomes differed substantially from those of prostate cancer cell lines. Conclusions: Genes differentially expressed in cancer are potential biomarkers for cancer detection, and those differentially expressed between G3 and G4 are potential biomarkers for disease stratification given that G4 cancer is associated with poor outcomes. Differentially expressed genes likely contribute to the prostate cancer phenotype and constitute the signatures of these particular cancer cell types.National Institutes of Health (NIH)[CA111244]National Institutes of Health (NIH)[CA98699]National Institutes of Health (NIH)[CA85859]National Institutes of Health (NIH)[DK63630][P50-GMO-76547

Regulation of mitochondrial morphogenesis by annexin a6.

Mitochondrial homeostasis is critical in meeting cellular energy demands, shaping calcium signals and determining susceptibility to apoptosis. Here we report a role for anxA6 in the regulation of mitochondrial morphogenesis, and show that in cells lacking anxA6 mitochondria are fragmented, respiration is impaired and mitochondrial membrane potential is reduced. In fibroblasts from AnxA6(-/-) mice, mitochondrial Ca(2+) uptake is reduced and cytosolic Ca(2+) transients are elevated. These observations led us to investigate possible interactions between anxA6 and proteins with roles in mitochondrial fusion and fission. We found that anxA6 associates with Drp1 and that mitochondrial fragmentation in AnxA6(-/-) fibroblasts was prevented by the Drp1 inhibitor mdivi-1. In normal cells elevation of intracellular Ca(2+) disrupted the interaction between anxA6 and Drp1, displacing anxA6 to the plasma membrane and promoting mitochondrial fission. Our results suggest that anxA6 inhibits Drp1 activity, and that Ca(2+)-binding to anxA6 relieves this inhibition to permit Drp1-mediated mitochondrial fission

Metabolic and miRNA Profiling of TMV Infected Plants Reveals Biphasic Temporal Changes

Plant viral infections induce changes including gene expression and metabolic components. Identification of metabolites and microRNAs (miRNAs) differing in abundance along infection may provide a broad view of the pathways involved in signaling and defense that orchestrate and execute the response in plant-pathogen interactions. We used a systemic approach by applying both liquid and gas chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry to determine the relative level of metabolites across the viral infection, together with a miRs profiling using a micro-array based procedure. Systemic changes in metabolites were characterized by a biphasic response after infection. The first phase, detected at one dpi, evidenced the action of a systemic signal since no virus was detected systemically. Several of the metabolites increased at this stage were hormone-related. miRs profiling after infection also revealed a biphasic alteration, showing miRs alteration at 5 dpi where no virus was detected systemically and a late phase correlating with virus accumulation. Correlation analyses revealed a massive increase in the density of correlation networks after infection indicating a complex reprogramming of the regulatory pathways, either in response to the plant defense mechanism or to the virus infection itself. Our data propose the involvement of a systemic signaling on early miRs alteration