Outcomes and satisfaction of two optional cadaveric dissection courses: a 3-year prospective study

Teaching time dedicated to anatomy education has been reduced at many medical schools around the world, including Nova Medical School in Lisbon, Portugal. In order to minimize the effects of this reduction, the authors introduced two optional, semester-long cadaveric dissection courses for the first two years of the medical school curriculum. These courses were named Regional Anatomy I (RAI) and Regional Anatomy II (RAII). In RAI, students focus on dissecting the thorax, abdomen, pelvis, and perineum. In RAII, the focus shifts to the head, neck, back, and upper and lower limbs. This study prospectively analyzes students' academic achievement and perceptions within the context of these two, newly-introduced, cadaveric dissection courses. Students' satisfaction was assessed anonymously through a questionnaire that included items regarding students' perception of the usefulness of the courses for undergraduate teaching, as well as with regards to future professional activity. For each of the three academic years studied, the final score (1 to 20) in General Anatomy (GA), RAI, and RAII was on average 14.26 ± 1.89; 16.94 ± 1.02; 17.49 ± 1.01, respectively. The mean results were lower in GA than RAI or RAII (P < 0.001). Furthermore, students who undertook these courses ranked them highly with regards to consolidating their knowledge of anatomy, preparing for other undergraduate courses, and training for future clinical practice. These survey data, combined with data on participating students' academic achievement, lend strong support to the adoption of similar courses as complementary and compulsory disciplines in a modern medical curriculum

Buddleja Cultivar Identification Using Microsatellite Markers

Buddleja (butterfly bush) is a genus of common landscape plants in temperate and subtropical gardens. Substantial breeding has led to a wealth of diverse cultivars with varied pedigrees. Molecular markers would be useful tools for breeders and others studying butterfly bush to identify cultivars. We evaluated SSR markers developed in Buddleja to fingerprint 11 cultivars to determine whether they were useful in cultivar identification. Markers Bud_03, Bud_10, and Bud_13 were polymorphic across all genotypes in the study and capable of accurate cultivar identification. These markers may be useful to breeders for intellectual property protection and to identify cultivars in instances of mislabeling

Role of Oryza sativa chitinases in disease resistance

Department Head: Thomas Holtzer.2010 Spring.Includes bibliographical references (pages 79-89).Plant chitinases have long been implicated in defense responses against invading pests and pathogens. In Oryza sativa cv. Nipponbare (rice), chitinases have been shown to co-localize with disease resistance QTL, and are thought to contribute to a multigenic basal defense response. Previous work has shown that overexpression of several O. sativa class I chitinases resulted in heightened resistance to the fungal pathogens Rhizoctonia solani and Magnaporthe oryzae pv. oryzae. Here, I examined the responses of several O. sativa chitinase classes to the RNAi silencing of two transcriptionally active rice chitinase genes LOC_Os02g39330 and LOC_Os04g41620. Silencing of these genes results in a reduction of expression in several additional rice chitinases, and also shows an increased susceptibility phenotype to fungal rice pathogens R. solani, M. oryzae pv. oryzae, and bacterial rice pathogen Xanthomonas oryzae pv oryzae. The relative amounts of silencing of the individual genes LOC_Os02g39330 or LOC_Os04g41620 were not significantly correlated with disease phenotype. Thus, we conclude that silencing of these target genes altered the expression of other chitinases, and perhaps other defense response genes that were not assayed, and that the combination of altered expression profiles contributed to increased susceptibility to the various pathogens

Development of an integrated genomic map for a threatened Caribbean coral (<i>Orbicella faveolata</i>)

ABSTRACTGenomic methods are powerful tools for studying evolutionary responses to selection, but the application of these tools in non-model systems threatened by climate change has been limited by the availability of genomic resources in those systems. High-throughput DNA sequencing has enabled development of genome and transcriptome assemblies in non-model systems including reef-building corals, but the fragmented nature of early draft assemblies often obscures the relative positions of genes and genetic markers, and limits the functional interpretation of genomic studies in these systems. To address this limitation and improve genomic resources for the study of adaptation to ocean warming in corals, we’ve developed a genetic linkage map for the mountainous star coral,Orbicella faveolata. We analyzed genetic linkage among multilocus SNP genotypes to infer the relative positions of markers, transcripts, and genomic scaffolds in an integrated genomic map. To illustrate the utility of this resource, we tested for genetic associations with bleaching responses and fluorescence phenotypes, and estimated genome-wide patterns of population differentiation. Mapping the significant markers identified from these analyses in the integrated genomic resource identified hundreds of genes linked to significant markers, highlighting the utility of this resource for genomic studies of corals. The functional interpretations drawn from genomic studies are often limited by the availability of genomic resources linking genes to genetic markers. The resource developed in this study provides a framework for comparing genetic studies ofO. faveolataacross genotyping methods or references, and illustrates an approach for integrating genomic resources that may be broadly useful in other non-model systems.</jats:p

Genetic diversity and population structure in Chrysolepis chrysophylla (golden chinquapin; Fagaceae): SSRs vs SNPs

Simple sequence repeat (SSR) and single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotypes on the same plant samples of Chrysolepis chrysophylla (Douglas ex Hook.) Hjelmq. (Fagaceae; golden chinquapin) from 22 sites were used to determine genetic diversity and population structure. One site of C. sempervirens (Kellogg) Hjelmq. allowed interspecific vs. intraspecific comparisons. SSRs and SNPs yielded many similar results. Among-site variation contributed 13% to 17% of the genetic variation and Fst estimates of 0.14 to 0.17 were in the range expected among Fagaceae species rather than among populations within a species. The northern sites tended to group separately on the first two axes of multivariate scatterplots from southern sites. Sites in two geographically isolated areas were divergent: (i) the Hood Canal, Washington population was relatively more genetically distant from other golden chinquapin sites than was our C. sempervirens site; (ii) three coastal southern California sites were moderately diverged. The Hood Canal site had a negative inbreeding coefficient, fewer alleles, lower heterozygosity, and differed from the Skamania County, Washington site as well as all other sites. Hood Canal trees are distinguished by disjunct geography and by these molecular results. This suggests that the golden chinquapin near Hood Canal be treated as a management unit, and potential conservation actions are discussed.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author

Genetic diversity and population structure in<i>Chrysolepis chrysophylla</i>(golden chinquapin; Fagaceae): SSRs vs SNPs

Simple sequence repeat (SSR) and single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotypes on the same plant samples of Chrysolepis chrysophylla (Douglas ex Hook.) Hjelmq. (Fagaceae; golden chinquapin) from 22 sites were used to determine genetic diversity and population structure. One site of C. sempervirens (Kellogg) Hjelmq. allowed interspecific vs. intraspecific comparisons. SSRs and SNPs yielded many similar results. Among-site variation contributed 13% to 17% of the genetic variation and Fstestimates of 0.14 to 0.17 were in the range expected among Fagaceae species rather than among populations within a species. The northern sites tended to group separately on the first two axes of multivariate scatterplots from southern sites. Sites in two geographically isolated areas were divergent: (i) the Hood Canal, Washington population was relatively more genetically distant from other golden chinquapin sites than was our C. sempervirens site; (ii) three coastal southern California sites were moderately diverged. The Hood Canal site had a negative inbreeding coefficient, fewer alleles, lower heterozygosity, and differed from the Skamania County, Washington site as well as all other sites. Hood Canal trees are distinguished by disjunct geography and by these molecular results. This suggests that the golden chinquapin near Hood Canal be treated as a management unit, and potential conservation actions are discussed.</jats:p

P-44 A Statistical Analysis of X-Ray Bursts Using Mutual Information

A statistical study on solar flares stronger than C1 class detected by the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) from 1975 to 2017 was performed. A sequence of waiting times (time elapsed between adjacent X-ray flare peaks) was constructed from the data. A surrogate waiting time distribution (WTD) is produced using a time varying Poisson firing rate from the Bayesian Block procedure (Scargle et al., 2012). Utilizing Shannon entropy, the mutual information of the original and surrogate waiting time sequences is then computed at various look-aheads. It is shown that the observed waiting time sequence has a mutual information greater than the constructed sequence that is statistically significant at relatively small timescales. This suggests there is structure not sufficiently captured by a non-stationary Poisson distribution, despite accurately representing the observed distribution