SYLLABUS FOR:

Bioethics Issues Arising from Advances in Cell Biology

CBIO 4990 SEMINAR IN CELL BIOLOGY

3:30-4:45 on Thursday

Room 723 Biological Sciences

Instructor: Judy Willis

Room 302 Biological Sciences

542-0802

jhwillis@cb.uga.edu

Text: Beyond Therapy Biotechnology and the Pursuit of Happiness A Report of the Presidentπs Council on Bioethics.

Copies have been ordered by local bookstores ($10.95) or you can access it on the Web

http://www.bioethics.gov/reports/beyondtherapy/

The book is available as a PDF file of 4.57 MB

It will cost more to print the book than to buy it.

A printed copy of the material from the WebSite is on reserve for this course in the Biology Learning Center

This class will have two components:

1: A discussion of the actual research that leads people to suspect that a particular treatment may be possible, i.e. what have been the ≥advances in cell biology?≤

2. A discussion of the ethical issues raised by the use of a particular therapy.

Each student will have the opportunity to present material to the class in each of these categories.

Discussion of each topic (introduced in Beyond Therapy) will be initiated with a presentation of specific research papers. It is anticipated that two students will have the opportunity to present data on a particular topic. The presenting student will first place a specific paper in a general context and then describe the precise experiments. The selected paper must be a primary research paper, not a review article. What was the aim of the paper, what was done and what was learned? How can the data from the paper be translated into something that could affect the behavior, physiology, etc. of healthy individuals? It is expected that figures of actual data will be shown and experimental techniques will be introduced in a comprehensible manner. Papers can be selected from those provided in the references for each section of Beyond Therapy, or you can use a more recent paper on the same general topic.

The initial plan is to assign two students to a particular category. They should discuss what subjects are relevant and choose together two complementary papers to present. Each student should have ultimate responsibility for presenting one of the papers.

jhw is available as a consultant when necessary as you prepare these presentations. You are urged discuss the appropriateness of your selection with her.

After the fundamentals are established, ethical issues raised will be discussed. We will learn if a formal debate with one student pro and another con is an effective way to introduce the ethical issues.

At first, we will begin with two experimental papers one week, followed by the ethical debate the next. The debate format will consist of initial statements from each participant, then there will be the opportunity first for the debaters to challenge each other and then for the entire class to question and debate the issue. It is the responsibility of the debaters to guide the discussion along productive lines and to assure that provocative questions are tossed out to the class to assure a lively discussion.

Date	Topic	Beyond Therapy or other Reference	Speakers
August 19	Course Overview; Assignment Lottery		J.H. Willis
August 26	Use of drugs/hormones to enhance athletic performance	Chapt. 3
September 2	Ethical Issues
September 9	Engineering of human embryos a) Genetic modification/selection b) drugs to modify behavior	Chapt. 2
September 16	Ethical Issues
September 23	Treating Aging ≠muscle and memory enhancement	Chapt. 4 IIIA.
September 30	Ethical Issues
October 7	Retarding Aging	Chapt. 4 III B
October 14	Ethical Issues
October 21	Using drugs to affect memory and moral responsibility	Chapt. 5
November 4	Ethical Issues
November 11	Embryonic stem cells vs. adult stem cells	see pg. 5
November 18	genetically incompatible vs. cloned stem cells	see pg. 5
December 2	Ethical Issues ≠ harvesting stem cells and preparing cloned stem cells	see pg. 5

LITERATURE SEARCHES

The material you use for your presentations on research findings pertinent to the topics we discuss can be identified in one of three ways:

1. References in ≥Beyond Therapy.≤

2. References gleaned from PubMed.

PUB MED: http://www3.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Entrez/index.html

Click on PubMed

You can generally get an abstract from PubMed, and sometimes can use a direct link to a journal article. Other times, the link will not recognize that you are using an UGA computer, and you will have to go to the UGA electronic journal locator to get access to the article, or you may need to use the actual journal in the Science Library.

UGA electronic journal locator: http://www.libs.uga.edu/ejournals/

If you do not have Adobe Acrobat installed on your computer you will not be able to copy Tables and Figures. It is essential that you examine the actual data in the papers you read and present it, as appropriate, to the class. Thus if you plan to get a copy of the paper from the WEB be sure to print the PDF file.

3. For references that present recent information related to a paper that is cited in ≥Beyond Therapy≤ use SCIENCE CITATION INDEX.

This is available as WEB OF SCIENCE on its own Web Site: http://isiknowledge.com or via GALILEO (Galileo can be accessed from terminals in the library or directly via the WEB: www.galileo.peachnet.edu/

Science Citation Index allows you to go forward from a paper of interest and learn who has cited it. You can also use it to see if an author of interest has published anything else recently and where that paper has been cited.

To use, click on GO for Web of Science,

then clear the two buttons other than Science Citation Index Expanded,

select time period beginning with year of paper you want to follow

scroll down, click on CITED REFERENCE SEARCH,

at CITED REFERENCE LOOKUP SCREEN, put in first author with all initials (no spaces),

click on search, and you will get reference to paper, be sure it is the one you want

click on view references (next to selected paper)

next screen, click on times cited

next screen will be all of the papers that cited your paper of interest

If you click on any one of them you will be able to read the abstract or if it has a link (SFX@UGA) just click on that. If you are on a UGA computer and the screen says ≥incorrect ID≤ ignore it and click on start. You should then be able to open the PDF file of the article.

To send reference to yourself , mark appropriate citations; click in box on right ≥submit≤, then marks; click on marked list (at top of screen); click on abstracts, if desired; click on e-mail; enter e-mail address; put your name in box for Notes, if you are sending references to me; click on send e-mail.

Be sure to LOGOFF, using ≥log off≤ on top of Web Page, when you are finished.

If you just use the close (X) button at the top of the screen, you may prevent another user from accessing this resource for several minutes. There is a limit to how many users from UGA can use this site at one time.

Background for ethics discussion can come from Beyond Therapy and material that should be available on the Web. Use Google: http://www.google.com/ Put in a key phrase followed by ethical issues. I got interesting results with ≥sex selection ethical issues≤ and ≥retarding aging ethical issues.≤ Beware, google does not screen for accuracy.

Here are some additional references that may be helpful:

The official NIH Web Site on stem cell research is: http://stemcells.nih.gov/index.asp

There is another 300 + page book published by the Presidentπs Council on Bioethics; it is: Human Cloning and Human Dignity: An Ethical Inquiry. The President's Council on Bioethics Washington, D.C., July 2002 http://www.bioethics.gov/reports/cloningreport/

In addition there is an NIH Web Site that is a reliable source of medical information: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/

Here you will find useful material if you enter topics such as: <gene therapy> or <anabolic steroids> or <retarding aging>.
ACADEMIC HONESTY

You must read UGA information on Academic Honesty. Either read pg. 5 of A Culture of Honesty - Policies and Procedures on Academic Honesty or find it on the UGA Web Site at:

http://www.uga.edu/ovpi/academic_honesty/sect05.htm

Any sign of plagiarism will be dealt with through appropriate University channels.

The official UGA definition of plagiarism from the above source follows (bolding from jhw):

"a. Plagiarism - This means submitting for academic advancement the words, ideas, opinions or theories of another that are not common knowledge, without fair attribution to that other person.

Unfair attribution includes, but is not limited to, a direct quotation of all or part of another's words without identifying that fact by appropriate marks, and/or merely stating the source generally in a bibliography without having noted the specified sources within the body of the work. Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to, the following acts when performed without fair attribution:

i. Directly quoting all or part of another person's written or spoken words without quotation marks, as appropriate to the discipline;

ii. Paraphrasing all or part of another person's written or spoken words without notes or documentation within the body of the work;

iii. Presenting an idea, theory or formula originated by another person as the original work of the person submitting that work;

iv. Repeating information, such as statistics or demographics, which is not common knowledge and which was originally compiled by another person;

v. Purchasing (or receiving in any other manner) a term paper or other assignment that is the work of another person and submitting that term paper or other assignment as the student's own work."

Please note: material on a WebSite is protected by the same rules as the printed page.

Material you present orally in class must be properly attributed. Give you listeners a sheet listing WebSites and other sources you used. Acknowledge sources on each power point view you show.

Grading Policy

Each student will begin the semester with an A in this course. This grade may be lowered if you fail to meet one or more of the following standards.

No more than one casual absence. Illness and major religious holidays are, of course, exceptions, but if you avail yourself of such an excuse, missing a class because you were asleep will be problematic.

Strong presentation -- clear, accurate, well organized, and engrossing. Improvement over the course of the semester may negate early problems.

Constructive critiques*

Active and intelligent participation in all sessions.

*Critiques will be written and handed in at the end of each session. They should begin with the most interesting thing you learned from each talk, and then provide an assessment of your colleagueπs performance with helpful suggestions for improvement and/or praise of a feature that was especially well done. Critiques may be as short as three or four sentences. Your name should be at the top of each page. The speakerπs name should be written immediately before your critique.

Critiques will be handed out to the speakers at the next class without your name. JHW will also provide a written assessment.