Seminars are offered at universities to help students learn about new areas and opportunities. Some recent seminar topics included epilepsy, Dravet Syndrome, and using pluripotent stem cells to study nervous cells and discover new epilepsy treatments. Another discussed small regulatory RNAs and their role in gene expression through RNA interference. A final seminar covered antisense drug therapy to treat genetic disorders by binding mRNA and preventing gene expression. Attending seminars provides opportunities to expand knowledge across different fields and make connections between new and familiar topics.

1. Seminars
“The knowledge doesn’t come to our hands if we don’t look for it”. Today, many
people place limits to their knowledge, and this provokes a “blindness” that prevents them
for exploring new things. In other words, people aren’t often willing to learn about other
aspects apart from the ones they already know about or like. However, there are lots of
techniques and opportunities that may help people to be familiar with other areas, and an
example of them is the assistance to seminars about science that are offered at the
university. In these seminars, mentors from different places of the United States come to
Puerto Rican universities, and they talk about certain themes of interest. Besides, they
provide information to students about the undergraduate, graduate or medical university
they come from, and this could be very helpful for students who are thinking about going to
another university in the states after graduating. In the other hand, there’s a simple
question: What are some of the themes discussed in the seminars?
One of the seminars offered in the university was about epilepsy. Epilepsy is a
seizure that affects a variety of mental and physical functions. A rare and catastrophic form
of this seizure is known as Dravet Syndrome. This is affecting many children in the world,
and it is caused by genetic mutations in ion channels of the nervous system. Now days,
scientists are using pluripotency as a technique to study the nervous cells and to discover
new treatments for this condition. Basically, pluripotency refers to a stem cell (embryonic
or adult) that has the potential to differentiate into any of the three germ layers: endoderm
(interior stomach lining, gastrointestinal tract, the lungs), mesoderm (muscle, bone, blood,
urogenital), or ectoderm (epidermal tissues and nervous system). Pluripotent stem cells can
give rise to any fetal or adult cell type.
Another seminar given on campus was about small regulatory RNAs (sRNAs).
Small RNAs are double stranded RNAs that regulate gene expression. They play very
important role through a mechanism known as RNA interference or gene silencing. This
occurs when double-stranded RNA is produced or externally introduced and then it induces
the degradation of mRNAs that carry the same sequences of nucleotides. As a result, the
protein that this mRNA codes for can’t be synthesized. In the other hand, this information
could be very helpful for scientists who are studying viruses’ infections. Viruses introduce
double-stranded RNAs to the cells and it induces the production of mRNAs that will then
be translated into undesirable proteins.
Finally, the antisense drug therapy was another theme of discussion in the seminars.
Antisense therapy is a form of treatment for genetic disorders or infections. When the
genetic sequence of a gene is known to be the cause of a particular disease, it is possible to
synthesize a strand of nucleic acid such as DNA or RNA that will bind to the mRNA made
by that gene and inactivate it, preventing its expression. This is because mRNA has to be
single stranded in order to be translated. Besides, it was talked about how nucleoside

2. bridges, such as ibuprofen, are used in antisense drug therapy, and also it was mentioned
how changes on them could alter a drug and affect patients.
In conclusion, the assistance to seminars is a good activity to “collect” knowledge
from different areas and gather them in a “safe case”, known as the brain. In other words,
seminars bring people the opportunity to learn new things and, as a result, they will be more
prepared for performing a good job in any area, because they will know in advance about
that field. Moreover, it is possible to make associations between the topics that are
discussed in seminars and the things people already know about other fields. For example,
the ion channels of the nervous cells can be associated with the ion channels of the plant’s
stomata. This simple association could have a positive effect on people because they
remember what they have learned before. Also it can lead to a better understanding of life.
So far, the people who don’t understand yet what seminars are about, I would say to them:
“Just assist, take a sit, and listen to the speaker.”