Three Essays due Friday Night
Cell Division
Literature Assignment Biology 140
Winter 2018
50 points
Due date: Friday, April 20, 2018 by midnight (11:59 p.m.) Once the Canvas assignments are open, you may submit the
assignment any time before the due date.
Overview
Choose a topic that is in some way related to cell division. You will find a primary
research article and a relevant review article and write a brief summary of the
primary review article, using background information from the review article.
Details about the assignment and how to find a primary research article are
described in this handout.
Objectives
• Students will become familiar with the scientific literature including the
identification of primary research articles and the use of common search
tools.
• Students will develop their scientific writing skills.
• Students will gain an in-depth understanding of an aspect of cell division or a
closely related topic.
Article summaries are to be written independently.
Text should not be similar to that of another student or the source material. It is highly
recommended that you choose a primary research article that is different from that chosen
by anyone you know. Plagiarism or shared work is a violation of the academic integrity
policy and penalties apply (see the course syllabus).
Assignment Submission
Your papers may be turned in by uploading them to the course Canvas site. It is the
students’ responsibility to make sure that the files will be in a form that can be easily read
and that they are not corrupted. Making pdf files before uploading is highly
recommended (files that are corrupted or cannot be read for any reason will receive zero
points for the assignment).There will be three assignments listed under the ‘Assignments’
heading in Canvas, one for your written materials, one for your primary research article,
and another for your review article (include your name in the file, scan or print as a
pdf file, and upload).
OR
Alternatively, hard copies of your summary and your primary research article may be
submitted by bringing them to the Natural Sciences office (114 SFC) and asking someone
to put them in my mailbox. Be sure that your name is on your summary, your
primary research article, and your review article.
Assignment Requirements
1. Choose any topic related to cell division. Some examples:
• regulation of cell division-cyclins
• chromosome structure
• the role of the cytoskeleton in cell division
• cytokinesis
• distribution of the cytoplasm and organelles during cell division
• genes required for cell division
• membranes and cell division
• polyploidy
• aneuploidy
• cancer and cell division
• apoptosis and cell division
These are just a few of many possible topics.
2. Choose a primary research article that is relevant to your topic and to the course
material (must be work at the cellular and molecular level). Choose an article from a
peer-reviewed journal that has been published within the last 5 years (information about
finding articles can be found below). Clinical research papers and case reports are NOT
acceptable.
3. Find a review article relevant to your primary research article. There may be reviews
listed in the references to the primary research article or try a PubMed search (click on
‘Review’ on the left side of the screen after typing your topic in the search box).
4. Write a short summary of the primary research article. The summary should be very
brief (1-3 pages, double-spaced).
• Put your name on your paper and in the name of the file.
• Do not use direct quotes.
Things to include in your summary:
a) a general discussion of background information
b) What question(s) are the authors trying to answer with this set of experiments?
c) a brief description of the types of techniques used in this paper (i.e. genetic
crosses, mutations, cell sorting, mass spectrometry, chromatography, gel
electrophoresis, in vitro translation, fluorescence microscopy, DNA sequencing,
etc.)
d) What do the authors conclude?
4. There will be 3 assignments posted on Canvas. Upload your summary, your primary
research article, and your review article to Canvas. Make sure that all three files are all
in pdf format. Articles must be the full article (links and abstracts are not
acceptable).
Information about Finding and Citing Scientific Articles
The Scientific Literature
The scientific literature is written by scientists for other scientists. Primary
research articles are written to describe a set of original experiments and the conclusions
drawn from these experiments. They provide new information to the scientific
community and the original data is presented in these papers. The papers are reviewed by
other scientists in the field (peer review) prior to publication and, based on this input, an
editor makes a decision as to whether the work merits publication. The format of primary
review articles varies somewhat between journals, but they are usually divided into
sections such as introduction, materials and methods, results, and discussion.
Review articles provide a summary and analysis of a topic. Many primary
research articles will be cited and the information provided by each study will be
summarized and analyzed by the author. Review articles generally have fewer authors
(one or two) than you will find on primary research articles; however there are many
exceptions to this and the number of authors can’t be the sole criterion for distinguishing
between the two types of publications.
Information about the scientific literature
Some resources that explain the differences between primary research articles and review
articles in the scientific literature:
http://undergraduatesciencelibrarian.org/a-very-brief-introduction-to-the-scientific-
literature/types-of-scientific-literature/
http://libguides.willamette.edu/review-research-articles
Citing the scientific literature
References must be listed at the end of your assignment in the CSE (formerly CBE)
format. Wikipedia is not an acceptable reference; although you may use it as an
introduction to the topic if you follow up by checking the facts in the listed sources (cite
the original works instead of the Wikipedia article).
The CSE (formerly CBE) format is used for referring to sources within the text and for
listing them at the end in a section entitled “Literature Cited” or “References”.
Example of CSE format:
Dhaunsi GS. Molecular mechanisms of organelle biogenesis and related metabolic
diseases. Med Princ Pract. 2005;14 Suppl 1:49-57.
See these sites for information about the CSE format:
http://writing.wisc.edu/Handbook/DocCBE.html
http://writing.wisc.edu/Handbook/DocCSE_NameYear.html#reflist
http://psu.libguides.com/CSE
http://psu.libguides.com/CSE/Carticles
Finding Resources
NCBI
The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI)
(http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) provides a set of databases containing the scientific
literature, DNA sequences, amino acid sequences, and many other types of information.
All of these databases are linked (for example, you can go directly from the gene to its
sequence and then to the scientific paper in which the sequence was originally published)
and can be easily accessed using Entrez (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/gquery).
PubMed is an NCBI database and is used to search the scientific literature. Many
articles will be available for free from any computer. Additional articles may be
available online if you are on campus since the university library may have a subscription
to the journal in which the article is published. Use the pull down menu in Entrez or on
the NCBI site to select the PubMed option. Use PubMed to find your primary and review
articles. Review articles can be selected using the filters sidebar (limits).
Brief instructions for using PubMed:
Go to:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed
• Enter the term you wish to search in the box.
• If you are looking for a review article, select “Review” on the sidebar (left
side of screen).
• Perform your search.
• Click on the title of a paper to see the abstract.
• Many of the papers will be available to the public or through the university
library by clicking on an icon (the location varies, so try something that looks
reasonable-often found in the upper right).
• Click on PDF to get the file in the published format.