通识教育中融入人类遗传学的教学实践

通识教育已经成为大学高等教育的重要组成部分,强调通专结合的办学理念,要求践行“以人为本”的教育实践。在教学实践中存在不少困难和困惑,需要不断总结和发展中国特色的通识教育体系。本文凝练了在人类生物学教学实践中如何融入人类遗传学知识的通识教学理念、案例和分析,以“人是什么”为切入点引入贴近生活的教学内容。通过现代进化基因组学知识,解析人类自身发展的过去、现在和未来所涉及的生物学核心问题。剖析人的经典属性及其与通识教育的特殊关联,进而引出基于问题的深层次思考。

Correction To:Germline stem cells in human

Correction to:Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy https://doi.org/10.1038/s41392-022-01197-3,published online 02 October 2022 In this article1,the legend in Fig.3 has a typo,“Extraembryonic”inadvertently supplied and published as Extraembroynic;the figure should have appeared as shown below.

Loss-of-function of sox3 causes follicle development retardation and reduces fecundity in zebrafish

Folliculogenesis is essential for production of female gametes in vertebrates.However,the molecular mechanisms underlying follicle development,particularly apoptosis regulation in ovary,remain elusive.Here,we gen erated sox3 knockout zebrafish lines using CRISPR/Cas9.sox3 knockout led to follicle development retardation and a reduced fecundity in females.Comparative analysis of transcriptome between sox3^-/-and wild-type ovaries revealed that Sox3 was invoIved in pathways of ovarian steroidogenesis and apoptosis.Knockout of sox3 promoted follicle apoptosis and obvious apoptosis signals were detected in somatic cells of stages III and IV follicles of sox3^-/-ovaries.Moreover,Sox3 can bind to and activate the promoter of cyp19a1a.Up-regulation of Cyp19a1a expression promoted 17β-estradiol synthesis,which inhibited apoptosis in follicle development.Thus,Sox3 functions as a regulator of Cyp19a1a expression,via 17β-E2 linking apoptosis suppression,which is implicated in improving female fecundity.

The genome-wide landscape of small insertion and deletion mutations in Monopterus albus

Insertion and deletion(indel) mutations, which can trigger single nucleotide substitutions on the flanking regions of genes, may generate abundant materials for disease defense, reproduction, species survival and evolution. However, genetic and evolutionary mechanisms of indels remain elusive. We establish a comparative genome-transcriptome-alignment approach for a large-scale identification of indels in Monopterus population. Over 2000 indels in 1738 indel genes, including 1-21 bp deletions and 1-15 bp insertions, were detected. Each indel gene had ～1.1 deletions/insertions, and 2-4 alleles in population. Frequencies of deletions were prominently higher than those of insertions on both genome and population levels. Most of the indels led to in frame mutations with multiples of three and majorly occurred in non-domain regions, indicating functional constraint or tolerance of the indels. All indel genes showed higher expression levels than non-indel genes during sex reversal. Slide window analysis of global expression levels in gonads showed a significant positive correlation with indel density in the genome. Moreover, indel genes were evolutionarily conserved and evolved slowly compared to nonindel genes. Notably, population genetic structure of indels revealed divergent evolution of Monopterus population, as bottleneck effect of biogeographic isolation by Taiwan Strait, China.

Germline stem cells in human

The germline cells are essential for the propagation of human beings,thus essential for the survival of mankind.The germline stem cells,as a unique cell type,generate various states of germ stem cells and then differentiate into specialized cells,spermatozoa and ova,for producing offspring,while self-renew to generate more stem cells.Abnormal development of germline stem cells often causes severe diseases in humans,including infertility and cancer.Primordial germ cells(PGCs)first emerge during early embryonic development,migrate into the gentile ridge,and then join in the formation of gonads.In males,they differentiate into spermatogonial stem cells,which give rise to spermatozoa via meiosis from the onset of puberty,while in females,the female germline stem cells(FGSCs)retain stemness in the ovary and initiate meiosis to generate oocytes.Primordial germ cell-like cells(PGCLCs)can be induced in vitro from embryonic stem cells or induced pluripotent stem cells.In this review,we focus on current advances in these embryonic and adult germline stem cells,and the induced PGCLCs in humans,provide an overview of molecular mechanisms underlying the development and differentiation of the germline stem cells and outline their physiological functions,pathological implications,and clinical applications.