UMBC Biological Sciences Department
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With more than 30 tenured and tenure-track faculty members and lecturers, UMBC’s Department of Biological Sciences is one of the university’s largest academic departments encompassing a wide breadth of research and teaching. Research faculty in the Biological Sciences focus on:
- Cell Biology
- Computational Biology
- Developmental Biology & Immunology
- Evolutionary Biology
- Molecular Biology & Genetics
- Neuroscience
- Plant Biology
Recent Submissions
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The Edge Effect
(QUBES, 2023-05-03)This module has students venturing outdoors to take a 50m transect and collect abundance data on plants utilizing quadrats in both edge and interior environment. Mathematically the goals of this module are to emphasize how ... -
Innies, outies and omphalophobia: 7 navel-gazing questions about belly buttons answered
(The Conversation, 2023-04-05) -
Linking Copper-Associated Signal Transduction Systems with Their Environment in Marine Bacteria
(MDPI, 2023-04-13)Copper is an essential trace element for living cells. However, copper can be potentially toxic for bacterial cells when it is present in excess amounts due to its redox potential. Due to its biocidal properties, copper ... -
RAT ATTACK! Population growth
(QUBES, 2023-04-07)This module contains exercises focused on the use and interpretation of logistic and exponential growth models. The module is based on an actual ecological phenomenon, the black rat population explosion that occurs every ... -
Issues of Question Equivalence in Online Exam Pools
(National Science Teacher's Association (NSTA), 2023-04)During the pandemic, the use of question pools for online testing was recommended to mitigate cheating, exposing multitudes of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) students across the globe to ... -
The Effect of COVID-19 on the Postdoctoral Experience: a comparison of pre-pandemic and pandemic surveys
(2021-12-18)In the interest of advocating for the postdoctoral community in the United States, we present results from survey data collected before and during the COVID-19 pandemic on the same population of postdocs. In 2019, 5,929 ... -
Volumetric microscopy of CD9 and CD63 reveals distinct subpopulations and novel structures of extracellular vesicles in situ in triple negative breast cancer cells
(2022-11-08)Secreted extracellular vesicles (EVs) are now known to play multifaceted roles in biological processes such as immune responses and cancer. The two primary classes of EVs are defined in terms of their origins: exosomes are ... -
Research Culture: Surveying the experience of postdocs in the United States before and during the COVID-19 pandemic
(eLife, 2022-07-26)In the interest of advocating for the postdoctoral community in the United States (US), we compared the results of surveys of postdocs carried out in 2019 and in late 2020. We found that respondents’ mental health and ... -
Editorial: Microbiome and microbial informatics
(Frontiers, 2022-10-19) -
The transcriptional regulator CtrA controls gene expression in Alphaproteobacteria phages: Evidence for a lytic deferment pathway
(Frontiers, 2022-08-19)Pilitropic and flagellotropic phages adsorb to bacterial pili and flagella. These phages have long been used to investigate multiple aspects of bacterial physiology, such as the cell cycle control in the Caulobacterales. ... -
Mercedes Burns to study arachnid evolution in Japan through prestigious NSF CAREER Award
(UMBC News, 2023-03-06) -
The Human Extracellular Matrix Diseasome Reveals Genotype-Phenotype Associations with Clinical Implications for Age-Related Diseases
(2023-03-10)The extracellular matrix (ECM) is earning an increasingly relevant role in many disease states and the process of aging. Analyzing these disease states is possible with GWAS and PheWAS methodology, and through our analysis, ... -
CONSERVATION BIOLOGY OF AN ENDEMIC SONGBIRD AND ITS PRIMARY BREEDING HABITAT: AN INVESTIGATION INTO HABITAT AVAILABILITY, IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE, AND CONSERVATION GENETICS OF THE ENDANGERED BAHAMA ORIOLE
(2022-01-01)The world is currently facing a global biodiversity crisis in response to human activity and climate change, with island endemic species among those most vulnerable to extinction. The Caribbean region, recognized as a ... -
Molecular Basis of Carcinogenesis in Rodent Models of Prostate Cancer
(2022-01-01)Recurrent genomic alterations in aggressive primary and metastatic castration resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) have been identified through intensive sequencing efforts of clinical tumor samples over the last two decades. ... -
Novel systems biology methods for the analysis, optimization, and visualization of kinetic and genome-scale stoichiometric models
(2022-01-01)Genetic and metabolic engineering has made it possible to use microbial organisms as systems that can be engineered for various applications such as bio-product generation and bioremediation. Being able to reverse-engineer ... -
Functional Characterization of ?-Linked Diglucoside Metabolism in Cellvibrio japonicus
(2022-01-01)Bacterial survival is determined by their ability to acquire and utilize nutrients from their environment. Organisms capable of exploiting diverse or niche nutrients gain a competitive advantage. The ?-diglucosides trehalose, ... -
Sex and design in our evolutionary cousins: The perception of beauty in nature
(Universitat de Valencia, 2022-11-28)Taking an evolutionary approach to the question of beauty, we discuss the expression and perception of sexual beauty across the animal kingdom. Animals experience beauty in their brains, and animal brains are tuned to ... -
Current challenges and future directions for engineering extracellular vesicles for heart, lung, blood and sleep diseases
(Wiley, 2023-02-12)Extracellular vesicles (EVs) carry diverse bioactive components including nucleicacids, proteins, lipids and metabolites that play versatile roles in intercellular andinterorgan communication. The capability to modulate ... -
Systematic In Silico Assessment of Antimicrobial Resistance Dissemination across the Global Plasmidome
(MDPI, 2023-02-01)The emergence of pathogenic strains resistant to multiple antimicrobials is a pressing problem in modern healthcare. Antimicrobial resistance is mediated primarily by dissemination of resistance determinants via horizontal ...