BARON, ALEJANDRA's blog

The end of the beginning

Since the beginning of the course, I realized that this class is not your typical honors class with rigorous structure and stressful examination and deadlines we need to meet each week, but rather a very unique, creative, fun discussion we have once a week to reflect on the important aspects of our lives; nature, art, and biotechnology. As honors students, we are often not given the opportunity of freedom and creativity in our regular courses.

A "Bananas" Topic

Experimenting on animals has been a sensitive topic for many decades because many believe it is inhumane and cruel, while others believe it is necessary for scientific advancement. I believe that I am stuck somewhere in the middle of the two because I identify myself as a researcher. Often, much of the medical knowledge we know today comes from experiments done on animals such as rats, cats, and monkeys.

Prunes, Plums, and Princesses

We learned about the history of the Hox Zodiac and its genetic diversity between animals and humans during the lecture. Hox genes are a group of genes that map specific regions of the body plan of an embryo. Hox genes are particular because the position of Hox genes ensures the correct structure and placement of the body. It was fascinating to learn about how homeobox genes (Hox) are critical for humans and animals, and all living beings share the same genes.

studying and sounds

During our lecture, I found it very interesting how our heart and brain rhythms are related to other rhythms that occur in our bodies. When we watched how fast our heart beats from 86 to 274 beats per minute, I started to think about how fast our blood needs to be pumping for our brain and body to receive all the necessary nutrients to keep our heart pumping.

Midterm season reflection

It's been halfway through the quarter, and I didn't expect to have this much fun while learning interesting topics in our biotechnology and art class. During the first four weeks of the quarter, we learned about a wide range of topics, from the pencil to mushroom and the process of breadmaking. The class began with learning about the pencil. A pencil is a tool we have used throughout our educational life, and we see the components that make up the pencil all around us when we step outside.

New Experiences

The lecture on bread making was very interesting to me because I got to investigate deeper into the components of bread and why the ingredients are used and complement each other. Flour is a powder that is made by grinding grain, beans, cuts, and even seeds to use in cooking or baking. Flour is a universal ingredient used all over the world to create delicious recipes and food.

Blossoms

Today after work, I randomly pinned a location on Google maps. My pin took me to a beautiful neighborhood in Burbank. It is approximately 20 minutes away from my house and 15 minutes away from my job. Besides going out to eat and visiting the mall, Burbank is not a city where I am accustomed to visiting and much less knowing many people that live in that area. I got off my car, and immediately I noticed a difference between my own neighborhood and Burbank. I walked down the street to even sidewalks, flowers blossoming at every house, and bright blue skies.

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