assignment

General notes for all introductions

1. Start out describing why you are looking at this gene- what brought it to your attention? Then describe what is already known about it. (BTW, all the genes were first found because there are different spliced isoforms expression in males and females during very early embryonic mouse development) (Planells paper)

Since we already know these genes are differentially spliced in mouse embryos, the steps of our protocols for this lab will allow you to determine what the splice isoforms are, whether there is a protein structure difference that results from the splice difference, and then what protein domains may be present/absent/altered when comparing the two version of the expressed gene at E11 of mouse development.

Hypotheses need to be specific and relevant to what will be tested by the experiment. So essentially everyone’s hypothesis will be of this sort: The different splice isoforms expressed in male and female mice at day E11 in the genital ridge will have differing protein domain structures”

--note that we can’t hypothesize beyond that even-that is, we can’t say “The different proteins (or isoforms) cause different sexual characteristics in mice” --- because we aren’t able to do an experiment to test that. Such a thing might be a good future direction… (hint hint)

(I wish we had time, and I had wanted to do it- to see whether human splice variants correlate with the mouse variants)

2. Is there something about what it is already known to do and sexual differentiation?

3. Level of writing- you can assume that the readers are your classmates, and have some basic knowledge of the central dogma.

4. At the first use of a term, explain it, provide the abbreviation that will be used for it later. – likewise, don’t use an abbreviation without using the full term the first time.

5. Use protein name version when talking about what the protein does, use gene name versions when talking about the gene, its expression or its splicing.

-mouse gene names are formatted with only the first letter capitalized, and the name in italics: Olf554 -mouse protein symbols are the same, but not italicized: Olf554 -human gene names are all capitalized, and italics: OLF554 -human protein symbols are all caps, no italics OLF554 (the full name, olfactory receptor 554 is just usual text)

6. Species names should be italicized: Mus musculus or Homo sapiens