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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Pseudomonas And Bacillus Soil Isolates Produce Antibiotics, Chelsea Brandt, Dr. Lori Scott Jan 2020

Pseudomonas And Bacillus Soil Isolates Produce Antibiotics, Chelsea Brandt, Dr. Lori Scott

Identifying and Characterizing Novel Antibiotic Producing Microbes From the Soil

The recent emergence of antibiotic resistance bacterial strains presents a significant challenge and threat to human healthcare. While new methods of treatment such as bacteriophage therapy and combinations of existing antibiotics are being researched, the human population is in dire need of new antibiotics to replace those that are ineffective. This research addresses this need by identifying antibiotic producing bacteria in a soil sample from Davenport, IA. This project is a collaboration with the Tiny Earth Project Initiative (TEPI), which is a global network of educators and students focused on studentsourcing antibiotic discovery from soil. Microbiology lab techniques and 16S …


Clinical Implications Of Evolutionary Modeling Of Cancer Progression, Kelsey Heiland May 2019

Clinical Implications Of Evolutionary Modeling Of Cancer Progression, Kelsey Heiland

Biology: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

Evolutionary theory of cancer was developed in 1976 by cancer research Peter Nowell and has illuminated the path toward increasing safety and efficacy of clinical treatment strategies. Major foundations that makeup the complexity in Darwinian framework of cancer includes clonal evolution, clonal expansion, and competition. Due to these characteristics, virtually all types of cancer have evolutionary capabilities to reject or adapt and become resistant to pharmaceutical therapies. Despite compelling evidence of these process, evolutionary modeling of cancer continues to be underutilized in clinical settings. Contributions to this include the complex adaptive mechanisms that tools fail to detect or are unable …


Functional Studies Of The E. Coli Proc And A Putative Ortholog Mrub_1345, Maureen Azar, Dr. Lori Scott May 2018

Functional Studies Of The E. Coli Proc And A Putative Ortholog Mrub_1345, Maureen Azar, Dr. Lori Scott

Meiothermus ruber Genome Analysis Project

This project is part of the Meiothermus ruber genome analysis project, which uses the bioinformatics tools associated with the Guiding Education through Novel Investigation –Annotation Collaboration Toolkit (GENI-ACT) to predict gene function. We investigated the biological function of Escherichia coli and Meiothermus ruber proC genes using the complementation assay. In this research project, mutants of varying severity to the functional state of the protein were developed. The results showed that two or more amino acid deletions reduced or eliminated ProC function. Amino acid substitutions, on the other hand, were not severe enough to impact ProC function. Double and triple mutants …


Examination Of Orthologous Genes (Mrub_2518 And B3728, Mrub_2519 And B3727, Mrub_2520 And B3726, Mrub_2521 And B3725) Responsible For Abc Phosphate Transporters In Two Species M. Ruber And E. Coli, Margaret Meyer, Dr. Lori Scott Jan 2018

Examination Of Orthologous Genes (Mrub_2518 And B3728, Mrub_2519 And B3727, Mrub_2520 And B3726, Mrub_2521 And B3725) Responsible For Abc Phosphate Transporters In Two Species M. Ruber And E. Coli, Margaret Meyer, Dr. Lori Scott

Meiothermus ruber Genome Analysis Project

In this project we investigated the biological function of the genes b3725, b3726, b3727, b3728 and Mrub_2518, Mrub_2519, Mrub_2520 and Mrub_2521 (KEGG map number 02010). We predict that these genes encode the components of a Phosphate ABC transporter: Orthologous genes Mrub_2518 (DNA coordinates 2565359..2566438) and b3728 encodes the periplasmic phosphate binding component; Orthologous genes Mrub_2519 (DNA coordinates 2566499..2567485) and b3727, and Mrub_2520 (DNA coordinates 2567496..2568326) and b3726 encode for the two transmembrane proteins; Orthologous genes Mrub_2521 (DNA coordinates 2568338..2569159) and b3725 encode for the ATP binding protein within the cytoplasm. Within the two species, M. ruber and E. coli, …


Obesity, Noah Rhodes Jan 2018

Obesity, Noah Rhodes

Global Issues in Public Health

Obesity is a worldwide issue that can be defined as a non-communicable condition which means that it is non-infectious and non-transmissible and it is defined as having a BMI over 30 even though BMI doesn’t account for the person’s muscle mass which causes some athletes to be considered obese just because they weigh a lot for their height. Diagnosing obesity can be a long process which includes a health history being taken, a general physical exam, calculation of BMI, and measuring waist circumference. Diagnosis of obesity also involves checking for problems such as high blood pressure, variation of cholesterol levels …


Semaphorin3a Increases Focal Adhesion Formation To Shift The Relationship Between Cell Migration And Substratum Concentration Through A Rock-Dependent Mechanism, Frances V. Compere, Scott Gehler Jun 2016

Semaphorin3a Increases Focal Adhesion Formation To Shift The Relationship Between Cell Migration And Substratum Concentration Through A Rock-Dependent Mechanism, Frances V. Compere, Scott Gehler

Celebration of Learning

Cell migration is essential for many life processes, including wound healing, embryonic development and cancer metastasis. Cells move across a surface by interacting and forming adhesions with the molecules in their environment, specifically the extracellular matrix. Past studies have shown that there is an optimal level of cell-substratum adhesive strength that allows for the most cell migration and spreading (DiMilla et al., 1993; Gaudet et al., 2003). The mechanism by which this works is not well understood, however. Semaphorin 3A (Sema3A) has been shown to increase the expression of integrin receptors, which help mediate the formation of the adhesions between …