Wikipedia talk:USEP/Courses/JHU MolBio Ogg SP14/Group 81C

Discussion on which article to choose
Hi Amy, Part of our assignment this week is to choose the article we want to work on and then write a summary. I know we are not limited to writing about the articles we summarized, but I would like to write about spermatocytes since it looks like the topic polysomy is taken. I don't mind writing about autosome either both topics are considered of high importance to be completed. Just let me know which one you prefer. Since the articles are on a first come first serve basis I put us down for spermatocyte, but it's very easy to edit and switch to another article.

I work in an IVF lab so, that's why the topic of spermatocyte intrigues me. The stub right now is very simple. If we do choose to work on this article. We can break down the spermatocyte topic: synthesis/formation, primary spermatocyte, secondary spermatocyte and so on. We can include more images and give a better summary for the pictures. I feel like this topic is fairly straight forward and it would be easy for us to find references and resources. Let me know what you think.Tatabox8 (talk) 05:25, 27 February 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Amy, Have you had a chance to think about what article you want to write about? I want to start writing our summary on what article we choose.Tatabox8 (talk) 18:11, 1 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Linda, I am fine with working on the spermatocyte topic. I don't know much about it (yet!), but I don't know much about the other topics either so...I agree, it seems pretty straightforward and I think we should be able to make a significant contribution towards improvement.-Amanaresi (talk) 21:25, 1 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Ok, I have added a rationale for our article. When you have a chance, please read over it and make any changes or add any information you find appropriate. I will start looking for more sources for our topic. Let me know what you think about the subtopics I listed and if you think the outline makes sense.Tatabox8 (talk) 06:49, 2 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Linda, good rationale! I added a few sentences to the paragraph.  I also added a potential subsection of the article, mutations, as I came across a few articles discussing this.  Just a suggestion, not sure if will end up needing to be there!-Amanaresi (talk) 00:23, 5 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Looks good! For this week, it looks like we will be looking for more references/images and start planning out our article. I think we are off to a good start with the subsections. I will make a sandbox for our outline and references.Tatabox8 (talk) 02:22, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Here is the link User:Tatabox8/sandbox-spermatocyteTatabox8 (talk) 02:39, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi Amy, I moved the outline/references to my sandbox page. I have put in a brief description next to each topic in our outline. I have gone through the sources I have listed and wrote in parenthesis in the reference section which information each source contains. I believe our article will be fairly short. There is not very much we can say about spermatocytes, but if we define it well and provide readers with great images and explaination about synthesis I think we will be good. I think we can elaborate on the mutation sections, but so far I only found one source. I hope to add more sources to our list and ask our OA about using images from some of our references. I checked the links we were provided to look for commerical safe pictures to use, but there were not that many to choose from. Most of the images that are great comes from textbooks or websites. Hopefully, we can find a few we can use to improve our article. I'll continue to add sources and think about what else we can discuss in our article. Feel free to add anything you think will be useful for writing our article. Once you take a look at it and think it's good. I can post it on the article talk page and see if we get any response from other wikipedians and see what they think about our appoarch to improving the article.Tatabox8 (talk) 07:52, 8 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks Linda. I will take a look and should make my contributions tomorrow morning.  I don't think length of the article should necessarily be an issue, as long as we can provide complete information and make a significant improvement.-Amanaresi (talk) 04:01, 11 March 2014 (UTC)


 * I totally agree, it's about the quality of information we provide not necessarily quantity. I added a few more references to the list. Most of which are sources for definition, synthesis and formation. There are so many sources on that we can be certain the information we will write is concise. I contacted Klortho about using images I found from various websites and will update you once he gets back to me. Feel free to post our ideas on the talk page of the article after you're done reviewing/contributing. Perhaps, we can get some other recommendations on what else we could add. I'm at a work conference this week and unfortunately there are only certain areas that have internet access. I will most likely not check until tomorrow evening. We are good for this unit after we post on the article talk page. This week we will start writing our article. Would you like to work on the sections together or split up the different sections? I'm fine either way. Just let me know!Tatabox8 (talk) 04:43, 11 March 2014 (UTC)


 * I added a bunch of references to our list, most of them involving spermatocyte mutation and failure. A few of the articles I did not have access to-maybe you will be able to gain access, but if not no big deal...I do not plan on purchasing them, I think we can make do! :) I'm wondering if there is a place where we can keep article pdf files where both of us have easy access?  Maybe on the blackboard page...  I posted our outline and a few words to the article talk page.  I think it may be easiest starting out to split up the sections for now, then we can add to each section as needed.-Amanaresi (talk) 20:24, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for adding our outline to the talk page of the article! I moved the references you added to my sandbox page. It looked like other classmates were just writing it on their sandbox page instead of creating one for the article, so if you didn't get to look at it check out my personal sandbox page for complete outline. As for the pictures I found we probably can't use it for copy right issues unless its open access. It's too bad because most of the good images are from textbooks and most websites use pictures from text as well. Klortho suggest we can draw our own. I might just do that. As for access to papers, I'm not sure if you know but JHU has an online database where we can log into read papers because they pay for the subscriptions and we pay tuition. Just look up JHU catalyst system if not I could try my work system they provide us with different access too. For splitting up the sections did you have a preference? There is about four sections Lead/Def, synthesis (sub category primary and secondary, Function, and Mutations. Then, we have to work on adding images, adding more links to relating articles and beefing up the existing table.Tatabox8 (talk) 02:01, 12 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi Amy, I have started to write the article offline. Since my internet connection is not strong at the moment. I am starting from our outline working my way down perhaps I'll leave the last section for you to work on and I'll upload it to turnitin to check it. Once, that is completed I will put it on wiki. Tatabox8 (talk) 01:58, 22 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Amy, quick update I have uploaded the article with a new definition and formation of spermatocyte section. I added the mutation section, but haven't started writing. I have been working on the image on inkscape and it's taking me longer than I thought to make the images. Hopefully, I will have it completed by tomorrow and get it up on the article page with description. There wasn't a ton of info I could write and I removed the old definition that was listed and unsourced. When I turned it into turnitin I found out that the person just plagarized the text. All the text in the article are 100% original now and it was submitted and checked on turnitin. There really isn't much to write about function since the spermatocyte form is like an intermediate step prior to sperm formation. So, all we have left is to talk about mutations, adding external links, and pics to make our article more complete. I made a progress section on our group page also. Please add any updates you make to it. I haven't seen any suggestions on the article talk page so, I guess we just go with our outline for now. When you have a chance read over it and let me know if there is anything you think I can add.I tried to keep things simple and unbiasedTatabox8 (talk) 06:22, 23 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks Linda. I should have something added about mutations by tonight.-Amanaresi (talk) 13:22, 24 March 2014 (UTC)
 * I did some rearrangements and removed the histology picture. It just didn't add any information and I didn't feel that it was necessary. I added two new sub section see also and external links. I uploaded a picture I made from inkscape. I didn't like the final product, but I think it expains the gist of the process. Drawing is by far not one of my strong suits and doing it on a foreign program was not that fun. If only we could use textbook images. Feel free to rearrange the article how you think/want I was playing around with wiki and trying to make our article look more complete.Tatabox8 (talk) 04:52, 25 March 2014 (UTC)
 * I added some info to the mutations section. I think I may be able to add some more info to that section if I do a more thorough search for articles.  Nice job with the diagram, and kudos for trying out inkscape!  I think the article is coming along very nicely.  As I was writing my section, I wondered if it would be helpful to include a diagram such as found in this link--to maybe make it more clear about differences between preleptotene and leptotene spermatocytes, for example.  Just a thought! Also, I haven't ran what I wrote through turnitin yet, as the site seems to be slow for me right now, but I will do so tomorrow!-Amanaresi (talk) 05:42, 25 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Great job on the mutations section. Our article is coming along nicely and with the peer reviews this week we can get some ideas to improve it. I Your idea to include the image for preleptotene and leptotene would be good. Hopefully, you can just use that image. Check with the OA. We have a couple more weeks until the final contribution I think we are in good shape.Tatabox8 (talk) 02:23, 26 March 2014 (UTC)
 * HI Amy, I added some new images and remove the one I made. I think the new images are better and will be more helpful. I did add some more writing and plan to add some more tomorrow. I have been editing our article here and there with the sugguestions by the reviewers. Just wanted to update you on that.Tatabox8 (talk) 06:14, 8 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi Linda, thanks for your additions-I think they have made a major improvement to the article! I apologize for not being able to work on the article much in the past week. I'm currently working to add more to the mutations section, and make either a failure subsection or add that as a new section.  I'm still searching for a "Creative Commons" licensed image of the spermatocyte germline (referenced in my last comment above)--basically your 'Schematic diagram of Spermatocytogenesis' in our article, but more detail of the primary spermatocyte section and adds spermatids.  If I can't find anything, I will start to work on my own-I'm not sure I'll be able to make something that looks non-amateurish by the due date tonight though.  If not, I will definitely have it by the next submission.  Do you think that there are any sections that could use some more info?  I am going through a bunch new articles I found, so I may add some to your sections here and there in the next few hours.  Thanks again -Amanaresi (talk) 23:34, 8 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi Amy, no worries. Feel free to add material to any of the sections. I have just been going through the suggestions of the reviewers and added content they think is useful while trying not to add too much fluff to our article. There isn't a ton of things that happen with the formation of spermatocytes and talking about the endocrinology I'm not sure how much to talk about because there is so, much I can talk about. Realistically, I just want to provide the essentials. I have alot of textbooks and there is not very much written in sections about spermatocytes because the main focus is usually the overall process of spermatogenesis. I think the info we have is good and whatever info you come across and find interesting you may want to add it. Much of the informtion about where and location of the process is describe in the spermatogenesis article and therefore, I dont want to repeat information they can read on another article. It just seems redundent.Tatabox8 (talk) 01:31, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Updates to article
Hi Amy, I made some changes to our article base off of the feedback we got from the reviewers.


 * 1) Made lead less technical.
 * 2) Updated wikitable with only info pertaining to our article.
 * 3) Fixed all the reference issues.
 * 4) Created new section with endocrine info. (Initially it was in the formation section, but since its primary info about the endocrine initiaiton I made it a section.)

I'm in the process of trying to find info to add a history section, but I can't find anything significant regarding spermatocyte discovery. Most is concentrated on sperm and spermatogenesis. I'm leaning towards adding a "Unique Properties of Spermatocytes in different species"? I was looking over the article Jen found on Pubmed. Perhaps we can find more. I'll keep looking for something to add. Tatabox8 (talk) 02:21, 21 April 2014 (UTC)


 * I ended up adding the unique section. We had good feedback to add info, but I just can't seem to find sources pertaining info for those material. I went to check out new books and there wasn't new info on spermatocytes that I could find. I know our article is short and that is something we established early on when we started writing, but the article has improved tremendously compared to what it was initially. I tried look for images to add for damage, repair and failure and mutations section, but didn't have any luck. The images from the articles are all copy righted and can't be used to post on web unless we have permission. :(. Not sure, if you contacted them or had any luck.Tatabox8 (talk) 05:02, 22 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Linda, I added a History section to our article, however it is pretty general to the spermatogenesis process as a whole. I think it will still be helpful for the article, however, as I noticed that this is not mentioned in the spermatogenesis article either, so it's not repeated information. I did manage to find an image for the mutations section from a Creative Commons source, so I included that.-Amanaresi (talk) 14:24, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes, that is pretty much all I could find on the history as well. Thanks for adding the picture! I have actually emailed all the authors of the papers to ask for permission because I wasn't sure if you did or not. I got a response today from the people who wrote the STRA8 paper and they said we have permission, but we need to check with the publisher before using the images/figures. I haven't heard from the others yet. I'll keep you updated when I hear back from them.Tatabox8 (talk) 01:35, 24 April 2014 (UTC)