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My name, Alexandra, is Greek and means “Defender of Mankind”. I was born in Aventura hospital on October 22nd, 2002, weighing exactly 8 pounds. My family consists of my father, my mother, my older sister, and myself. To me, my childhood was the best as it could have been, due to me always having a bright smile on my face and always being around family. I grew up in the city of Miami gardens, and I have been living here since. My family means everything to me, and it will always remain that way. My family is my backbone and without them, I would not have any stability and would not be able to survive. Both of my parents were born on the small island of Trinidad, which makes me 100% Trinidadian. I graduated from William H. Turner Technical High School in 2021. Currently, I am 20 years old, and I am working toward earning my AA from Miami Dade college. My home campus is the north campus, and my major is Health Services Administration.  This spring 2023 semester will be my last semester before I graduate and hopefully, I will head to Orlando and attend UCF to complete my bachelor’s degree. I have never had a job, but recently I have been applying to many and I even had a couple of interviews with a hospital. Although sports are not for me, I have other hobbies. I have a weakness for shopping. I would shop all day if I was able to. I enjoy reading scientific and romance novels. My favorite book is the romance novel called “Me Before You”. I have reread the book about 7 times, and the number will increase dramatically within the next few years. My future goals would be to be still living in Florida, preferably in Tampa, Florida. I would hope to have graduated with my Bachelor’s, or even master’s degree from the University of Central Florida in Health Services Administration and have a successful life, with a beautiful family.

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Which is the correct axis placement for the independent variable on a graph?

A. Y-Axis

B. W-Axis

*C. X-Axis

D. G-Axis

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Can this be used in our daily life when dealing in the news?  How?

A claim is a statement that is arguable and can be proved by evidence. It is not a personal opinion. Evidence is reliable information that supports or backs up your claim. While choosing your evidence, it is very important to cite the sources you use so that it can be verified as a reliable source. Reasoning tells how or why the evidence you’ve given supports your claim. Using the claim, evidence, and reasoning format when dealing in the news is very important, due to them not being able to spread personal opinions. If something is said on the news, most people will not choose to believe it until they receive evidence and reasoning for it. Receiving evidence for something said on the news is the most important factor, because, of course, people would want to see or hear what actually happened. Once the evidence is made known, people might start to ask why or how the evidence supports the claim, which is reasoning. Using the claim, evidence, and reasoning format is used in our everyday life without us realizing it.

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The Latin "scientific" name for the Monarch Butterfly is Danaus plexippus. This species is an invertebrate and feeds on plants, making it a herbivore. Monarch butterflies typically live up to 6 to 8 months, depending on their environment. Their wingspan can be 3.7 to 4.2 inches and they weigh 0.0095 to 0.026 ounces. Monarch butterflies live in North, Central, and South America as well as Australia, some Pacific Islands, India, and Western Europe.

Source:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/facts/monarch-butterfly

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What is the biggest single-celled organism?

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What is the biggest single-celled organism?

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What is the biggest single-celled organism? - Murry Gans

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After watching Coronavirus vs flu: Which is more dangerous? , one thing that I found interesting is how when the coronavirus first started, it was guaranteed that two out of every hundred people who get the virus are most likely to die from it. Since they did not know much about it, scientists believed it was a mild condition and that the flu was more likely to kill than the coronavirus.

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Coronavirus vs flu: Which is more dangerous? | DW News

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Quiz #3. Why is it so hard to cure the common cold?

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Quiz #3. Why is it so hard to cure the common cold?

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Why is it so hard to cure the common cold?

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Every fall, as temperatures begin to drop in North America, monarch butterflies from as far north as Canada set out on migration to warmer, southern climates. As the only butterfly species that completes a two-way migration, the monarchs will begin their return to the north in the coming spring. But monarch butterflies and their migration are now threatened by temperature changes, drought, and other climate change impacts. A long-term decline in numbers among eastern and western populations shows how vulnerable monarchs are in North America.

The butterflies' winter habitat in Mexico and California is rapidly shrinking due to deforestation, harsh weather, development, and other disruptions. Because all monarchs gather in only a few locations, the overall population is at risk. Especially during the last decade, changes in climate have resulted in more out-of-season storms, severe temperature drops, and excessive rain. The combination of both wet and cold is deadly and has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of millions of butterflies.

sources:https://www.nps.gov/articles/monarch-butterfly.htm#:~:text=Monarch%20butterflies%20live%20mainly%20in,long%20proboscis%20to%20sip%20food.

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What caught your attention in the video?  Why?

While watching the video, what caught my attention is that positive feedback in nature can be an essential force in the buildup of ecosystems. Positive feedback is not named positive feedback because it is beneficial. It is called positive feedback because it amplifies a particular effect or changes from previous conditions. Although this positive feedback can be helpful, it can be harmful as well.

Source: https://youtu.be/inVZoI1AkC8

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Feedback loops: How nature gets its rhythms - Anje-Margriet Neutel

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What I found interesting is that in order to become a butterfly, the caterpillar's body dissolves almost completely. Once dissolved, it is rebuilt from its own juices. That is super interesting to me because nature within itself is so beautiful. It is beautiful how one little caterpillar can go through a life cycle, build a new body and go through a whole new life cycle.

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The life cycle of the butterfly - Franziska Bauer

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What caught my attention in the termite mini-lecture is that the queen's abdomen completely stretches to make an egg-laying machinery. Another factor that caught my attention was learning that the Queen termites live up to 20 years, and some scientists have found termites of 100 years old.

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Chromosomes are tiny structures inside cells made from DNA and protein. The information inside chromosomes acts like a recipe that tells cells how to function and replicate. Every form of life has its own unique set of instructions, including you. Your chromosomes help describe unique features you will develop like eye color and height. Chromosomes are found in the nucleus of every cell. Different forms of life have different numbers of chromosomes in each cell. Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes for a total of 46 chromosomes in each cell. Within each chromosome are specific sections of DNA called genes. Each gene contains the code or recipe to make a specific protein. These proteins determine how we grow and what traits we inherit from our parents. The gene is sometimes called a unit of heredity.

Source: https://www.ducksters.com/science/biology/chromosomes.php

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The endoplasmic reticulum is a collection of tubes that make, package, and transport proteins and fats. The rough endoplasmic reticulum has protein-making ribosomes on its surface, so it helps create and process proteins. Rough ER is called rough because it has ribosomes attached to its surface. The rough ER  is also attached to the nuclear envelope that surrounds the nucleus. This direct connection between the perinuclear space and the lumen of the ER allows for the movement of molecules through both membranes.

Source: http://www.biology4kids.com/files/cell_er.html#:~:text=Rough%20ER%20is%20called%20rough,are%20pinched%20off%20in%20vesicles

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An enzyme substrate is the material on which the enzyme operates in biochemistry. The term substrate is sometimes used interchangeably with the term reactant, which refers to the molecule consumed in a chemical reaction. When the enzyme has attached to the substrate, the molecule is called the enzyme-substrate complex. For example, the sugar found in milk is called lactose. With the aid of the enzyme, lactase, the substrate, lactose, is broken down into two products, glucose and galactose.

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An enzyme is a biological catalyst and is almost always a protein. It speeds up the rate of a specific chemical reaction in the cell. The enzyme is not destroyed during the reaction and is used over and over. Enzymes include detoxification, muscle building, and breaking down food particles during digestion. Enzymes actually accelerate the rate of a chemical reaction to support life. Enzymes are very helpful in performing important functions of our body.

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I chose a monarch Butterly because butterflies typically represent a free spirit, which I am. Monarch Butterflies are very sensitive to changes in temperature as they rely heavily on this factor to prompt migration, hibernation, and reproduction.  changes in temperature due to climate change are expected to influence and potentially disrupt these critical stages of the butterflies life cycle. Not only are temperatures rising in some regions of the Monarch’s range, but precipitation levels are also increasing. Increased rainfall has been found to reduce the amount of time that the butterflies spend on laying their eggs. In addition, when the moisture coincides with colder temperatures in their overwintering grounds, it is challenging for Monarchs to endure these harsh conditions for more than a few hours.

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The monarch butterfly exhibits the most highly evolved migration pattern of any known species of butterfly or moth, perhaps of any known insect. Every autumn, millions of specimens, several generations removed from the previous year's migrants, fly south and westward from southern Canada and the United States. Researchers analyzed the monarch’s evolutionary origins using genetic comparisons. They traced the ancestral lineage of monarchs to a migratory population that likely originated in the southern U.S. or Mexico. The monarch's current worldwide distribution appears to stem from three separate dispersal events. To Central and South America; across the Atlantic and across the Pacific. The monarch’s North American origin runs counter to a long-standing hypothesis that the butterfly originated from a non-migratory tropical species, which later developed the ability to migrate. While historical records have suggested that the monarch’s dispersal across the Pacific and Atlantic occurred in the 1800s, the analysis indicated the monarch actually crossed the oceans thousands of years ago.

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To better understand monarch genetics and the basis for migratory behavior, Kronforst's team sequenced and compared the genomes of 101 butterflies, including migratory North American monarchs, non-migratory monarchs from around the world and a few closely related species.

The researchers analyzed the monarch's evolutionary origins using genetic comparisons. They traced the ancestral lineage of monarchs to a migratory population that likely originated in the southern U.S. or Mexico. The monarch's current worldwide distribution appears to stem from three separate dispersal events-to Central and South America; across the Atlantic and across the Pacific. In all three cases, the butterfly independently lost its migratory behavior.

The monarch's North American origin runs counter to a long-standing hypothesis that the butterfly originated from a non-migratory tropical species, which later developed the ability to migrate. While historical records have suggested that the monarch's dispersal across the Pacific and Atlantic occurred in the 1800s, the analysis indicated the monarch actually crossed the oceans thousands of years ago. The authors note that more work needs to be done to fully document the butterfly's evolutionary history.

"In order to clearly resolve the history of monarch butterflies, we still need additional fossil, archaeological and genetic data, as well as more advanced technology, becoming available in the future," said study author Shuai Zhan, a professor in Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences and a former joint postdoctoral fellow at the University of Chicago and the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

Slow and Steady

To study the genetic basis for migration, the team compared the genomes of migratory butterflies against the three non-migratory populations. They identified more than 500 genes-most of which are involved in muscle, developmental and neural function-that differed to some degree. But a single gene disparity stood out.

Migratory butterflies expressed greatly reduced levels of collagen IV α-1, a gene involved in flight muscle formation and function. The team discovered that migratory monarchs consumed less oxygen and had significantly lowered flight metabolic rates, which likely increases their ability to fly long distances compared to non-migratory butterflies.

"Migration is regarded as a complex behavior, but every time that the butterflies have lost migration, they change in exactly the same way, in this one gene involved in flight muscle efficiency," said Kronforst. "In populations that have lost migration, efficiency goes down, suggesting there is a benefit to flying fast and hard when they don't need to migrate."

The Color Gene

The researchers also investigated the genetic basis for the monarch's famous coloration. A small percentage of monarchs, most notably in Hawaii, possess white and black wings instead of orange. Comparing the genomes of these butterflies against normally colored populations, the team discovered a single gene appears to function as a pigmentation switch.

This gene, which codes for a protein of the myosin motor protein family, has never before been implicated in insect coloration. Its mutation likely disrupts the pigment transport to the wings, making the monarchs white. A related gene in mice, myosin 5a, has been shown to affect coat color in a similar way. The gene represents a new genetic pathway to explore insect coloration, according to Kronforst.

Migration in Peril

Although the monarch isn't in danger of extinction, its famous mass migration across North America appears to be in peril. In 1996, around one billion monarchs migrated to Mexico for the winter. Estimates for the past year place the number at around 35 million. A likely culprit is the loss of milkweed, the monarch's primary habitat, due to agricultural herbicide use. Meanwhile, monarchs that used to migrate are transitioning into non-migratory populations around the Gulf Coast.

The results of this study emphasize the need for conservation efforts to preserve the iconic migration and extend the extraordinary evolutionary history of the monarch butterfly, according to the authors.

"You used to see huge numbers of monarchs, clouds of them passing by," said Kronforst. "Now it looks quite possible that in the not too distant future, this annual migration won't happen."
The study, "The genetics of monarch butterfly migration and warning colouration," was supported by the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation and Neubauer Funds from the University of Chicago. Additional authors include Wei Zhang from the University of Chicago, Kristjan Niitepold and Jeremy Hsu from Stanford University, Juan Fernandez Haeger from the University of Cordoba, Myron P. Zalucki from the University of Queensland, Sonia Altizer from the University of Georgia, Jacobus C. de Roode from Emory University and Steven M. Reppert from the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

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Genetic secrets of the monarch butterfly revealed

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To better understand monarch genetics and the basis for migratory behavior, Kronforst's team sequenced and compared the genomes of 101 butterflies, including migratory North American monarchs, non-migratory monarchs from around the world and a few closely related species. The researchers analyzed the monarch's evolutionary origins using genetic comparisons.

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The brain has everything to do with love. Infatuation or passionate love is referred to as the first stage of love, where you excessively daydream about the other person, and always wanting to spend more and more time together. When it comes to the brain, infatuated Individuals show increased activation in the ventral tegmental area (VTA). The VTA is the award processing and motivation hub of the brain. This increased VTA activity is the reason love is not only euphoric but also draws you closer to your partner. Although this first stage of love can be intense on brain activity and emotions, it normally only lasts about a couple of months. The next stage is a more long-lasting stage of love, known as attachment, or compassionate love. As your relationship develops, you become more relaxed around your partner thanks to the two hormones oxytocin and vasopressin. These are pair bonding hormones that signal trust, feelings of social support, and attachment. During this stage problems in your relationship may become more evident as well. Finally, No matter how painful a heartbreak may be, we can always blame the brain. The distress of a breakup activates the insular cortex, which is a region in the brain that processes pain. Doing activities that you love, such as listening to music, or exercising triggers the response of the feel-good neurotransmitter dopamine. Given the time and support, most can heal and learn from the most devastating heartbreaks.

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The science of falling in love - Shannon Odell