This Communication and Argumentation seminar is an intensive writing workshop that focuses on argumentation and communication. Students learn to write and present their ideas in cogent, persuasive arguments and other analytical frameworks. Reading and writing assignments and other exercises stress the connections between clear thinking, critical reading, and effective writing.

The course focuses on casting contemporary problems in systems biology and functional genomics in computational terms and providing appropriate tools and methods to solve them. Topics include genome structure and function, transcriptional regulation, and stem cell biology in particular; measurement technologies such as microarrays (expression, protein-DNA interactions, chromatin structure); statistical data analysis, predictive and causal inference, and experiment design. The emphasis is on coupling problem structures (biological questions) with appropriate computational approaches.

Students demonstrate the erythrocyte sedimentation rate test (ESR test) using a blood model composed of tomato juice, petroleum jelly and olive oil. They simulate different disease conditions, including rheumatoid arthritis, anemia, leukocytosis and sickle-cell anemia, by making appropriate variations in the particle as well as in the fluid matrix. Students measure the ESR for each sample blood model, correlate the ESR values with disease conditions and confirm that diseases alter blood composition and properties. During the activity, students learn that when non-coagulated blood is let to stand in a tube, the red blood cells separate and fall to the bottom of the tube, resulting in a sediment and a clear liquid called serum. The height in millimeters of the clear liquid on top of the sediment in a time period of one hour is taken as the sedimentation rate. If a disease is present, this ESR value deviates from the normal, disease-free value. Different diseases cause different ESR values because blood composition and properties, such as density and viscosity, are altered differently by different diseases. Thus, the ESR test serves as a real-world diagnostic screening test to identify indications of the presence of any diseases in people.

Students will learn to fabricate, remix, and design detection and monitoring devices for health following the core focus of the Tricorder: a portable, handheld diagnostic device which can brings health solutions to consumers at home or in remote parts of the world. Inspired by the Tricorder X-Prize (with a purse of $10 million), students will aim to create specific component technologies that integrate into a comprehensive Tricorder mechanism capable of reading vital signs and specific disease biomarker detection. Component areas will include optical, electric, biochemical, and molecular diagnostics.

This is an assignment for a diagnostic essay to be used at the beginning of a composition I class to assess the students level of writing.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Exosomes are tiny membrane-bound vesicles that could be cutting-edge tools for cancer diagnosis and treatment. Exosomes are released by nearly every cell type to transport biomolecule cargo between cells and can be found in most body fluids. Among exosome cargos, microRNAs have draw significant attention for their role in the development of various diseases. MicroRNAs are small non-coding RNA molecules that can regulate the expression of protein-encoding genes. Exosomal microRNAs have shown promise as diagnostic biomarkers and as therapeutic targets or even therapeutics themselves. Studies have suggested that the microRNAs in cancer cell exosomes resemble the microRNA pool from their parent cancer cell. Exosomal microRNAs may be of particular use for the detection and treatment of hematologic neoplasms, which include cancers like lymphoma and multiple myeloma. However, there are several barriers than need to be addressed before exosomal microRNAs can be used in clinical settings..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Congenital heart defects affect approximately 1% of all babies born each year and account for almost 20% of all newborn deaths. Early diagnosis while still in the womb can greatly improve an affected baby’s chance of survival. Unfortunately, diagnosis relies exclusively on ultrasound imaging, where accurate readings aren’t guaranteed. Researchers in Japan are tackling this problem by enlisting the help of artificial intelligence. More importantly, they’re helping the doctors entrusted with patient care to understand how AI programs spot heart defects. Advancements in artificial intelligence have improved how congenital heart defects are diagnosed. Ultrasound videos of fetal hearts beating normally and others with structural defects can be studied with AI, which can then determine whether the fetal hearts in new videos are abnormal or not..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This lesson introduces the MRI Safety Grand Challenge question. Students are asked to write journal responses to the question and brainstorm what information they will need to answer the question. The ideas are shared with the class and recorded. Students then watch a video interview with a real life researcher to gain a professional perspective on MRI safety and brainstorm any additional ideas. The associated activity provides students the opportunity to visualize magnetic fields.

Students are given an engineering challenge: A nearby hospital has just installed a new magnetic resonance imaging facility that has the capacity to make 3D images of the brain and other body parts by exposing patients to a strong magnetic field. The hospital wishes for its entire staff to have a clear understanding of the risks involved in working near a strong magnetic field and a basic understanding of why those risks occur. Your task is to develop a presentation or pamphlet explaining the risks, the physics behind those risks, and the safety precautions to be taken by all staff members. This 10-lesson/4-activity unit was designed to provide hands-on activities to teach end-of-year electricity and magnetism topics to a first-year accelerated or AP physics class. Students learn about and then apply the following science concepts to solve the challenge: magnetic force, magnetic moments and torque, the Biot-Savart law, Ampere's law and Faraday's law. This module is built around the Legacy Cycle, a format that incorporates findings from educational research on how people best learn.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Gastric cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. One factor linked to the disease is an aberrant mucin profile in the gastric mucosa. Mucin proteins are the major building blocks of mucus and normally support the barrier function of the gut lining. But abnormal shifts in mucin makeup are believed to disrupt the gut microbiome in ways that facilitate tumor progression. To explore how, researchers examined tumor tissues from 108 patients with gastric cancer. Tumors associated with poor survival were found to overexpress the mucin gene MUC13. Overexpression of MUC13 was, in turn, linked to increased abundance of certain oral bacteria, namely, Neisseria, Prevotella, and Veillonella, which are known to promote inflammation. Deciphering these mucin-microbiome signatures in gastric cancer could make a big impact in prevention and treatment, as they could signal disease before symptoms of gastric cancer set in..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Through this unit, students act as engineers who are given the challenge to design laparoscopic surgical tools. After learning about human anatomy and physiology of the abdominopelvic cavity, especially as it applies to laparoscopic surgery, students learn about the mechanics of elastic solids, which is the most basic level of material behavior. Then, they explore the world of fluids and learn how fluids react to forces. Next, they combine their understanding of the mechanics of solids and fluids to understand viscoelastic materials, such as those found in the human body. Finally, they learn about tissue mechanics, including how collagen, elastin and proteoglycans give body tissues their unique characteristics. In the culminating hands-on activity, student teams design their own prototypes of laparoscopic surgical robots remotely controlled, camera-toting devices that must fit through small incisions, inspect organs and tissue for disease, obtain biopsies, and monitor via ongoing wireless image-taking. They use a (homemade) synthetic abdominal cavity simulator to test and iterate the prototype devices.

This three-week module, centered on a focal case, represents the second part of the Department’s introduction to the challenges of reflection and action in professional planning practice. As such, it builds on the concepts and tools in 11.201 and 11.202 in the fall semester. Working in teams, students will deliver a 20-minute oral briefing, with an additional 10 minutes for questions and comments, in the last week of the class (as detailed on the assignment and posted course schedule). The teams will brief invited guests (“briefees”) taking the roles of decision makers. DUSP faculty and fellow students may also be in attendance.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are small membrane-bound structures released by cells into the surrounding environment. EVs carry various biomolecules including proteins, DNA, RNA, and lipids and play critical roles in intercellular communication, including influencing the behavior and function of recipient cells. EVs have great potential in the clinical environment as diagnostic markers, treatment delivery vehicles, or therapeutic targets. However, to best utilize them researchers need to understand the mechanisms influencing EVs. Significant progress has been made in understanding the factors that regulate communication between cells via EVs, but there is still much to learn about what regulates EV targeting and uptake by recipient cells. Also, little is currently known about cargo release and relocation within the recipient cell. This is due to the extremely small size of EVs and a lack of imaging technology to visualize them..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Students are presented with a biomedical engineering challenge: Breast cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer-related death among women and the American Cancer Society says mammography is the best early-detection tool available. Despite this, many women choose not to have them; of all American women at or over age 40, only 54.9% have had a mammogram within the past year. One reason women skip annual mammograms is pain, with 90% reporting discomfort. Is there a way to detect the presence of tumors that is not as painful as mammography but more reliable and quantifiable than breast self-exams or clinical breast exams? This three lesson/three activity unit is designed for first-year accelerated or AP physics classes. It provide hands-on activities to teach the concepts of stress, strain and Hooke's law, which students apply to solve the challenge problem.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Advancements in next-generation sequencing have opened the door to detailed analyses of the human microbiome. This technique has many applications, and pancreatic cancer research is one of them. Pancreatic cancer is a devastating disease with an estimated 5-year survival rate of only 11%. Most cases, over 80%, are not found until the cancer is too advanced to successfully treat, but pancreatic cancer patients show shifts in their oral microbiome, which could be detected years earlier than current methods allow. Pathogenic oral bacteria have also been found within pancreatic tumors, which is another potential link between them. However, these findings barely scratch the surface of how the oral microbiome relates to pancreatic cancer. The oral microbiome is influenced by a combination of host-related and environmental factors, which include genetics, race, ethnicity, smoking, socioeconomics, and age..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Physicians may soon be able to get a detailed look at blood vessels surrounding breast tumors quickly, painlessly, and without radiation, thanks to the work of a team of Japanese researchers. One application of the technology is earlier and more accurate tracking of when cancer has turned deadly. The formation of new blood vessels around a tumor is a key sign that cancer is getting ready to spread. But getting a clear look at these blood vessels can be tricky. Approaches like MRI or computed tomography often come with a hefty price tag, and exposure to contrast agent or radiation may pose health risks. To sidestep these issues, the researchers optimized a way to perform photoacoustic imaging. This type of imaging utilizes the light-absorbing properties of hemoglobin to show where blood is flowing in the body. When hemoglobin is exposed to pulses of laser light, it produces small vibrations. These vibrations are picked up by scanners and used to generate a detailed map of blood vessel architecture..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Researchers have taken a significant step towards personalizing the treatment of cancer. Using DNA sequencing, they’ve developed a way to scan blood samples for mutations in circulating tumor DNA -- small bits of genetic material that are released as cancer cells die. The genomic reservoir contained in this DNA is representative of nearly all tumors carried by a patient, providing the foundation needed for comprehensive genetic profiling. Such profiling may help clinicians select the most appropriate therapies for a given patient. The genetic mutations giving rise todrivingthat drive cancer development often differ markedly among individuals. Interventions that match a patient’s unique genetic profile offer great promise, but obtaining tumor tissue for genetic testing can be invasive, and risky and sometimes impossible. To bypass these limitations, the researchers established a way to enrichextract, sequence, and analyze circulating tumor DNA..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.