Unmet Expectations in Health Care Settings: Experiences of Transgender and Gender Diverse Adults in the Central Great Plains.

Transgender and gender diverse (TGD) individuals face a long-term, multifaceted process if they choose to begin a gender affirmation journey. Decisions to go on hormone therapy and/or have a surgical procedure necessitate the TGD individual to set up an appointment with a health care provider. However, when TGD patients interact with health care practitioners, problems can arise. This article documents and categorizes the types of unmet expectations that are common in the TGD patient-health care provider social dynamic in the Central Great Plains of the United States. Utilizing a community-based participatory research model, qualitative in-depth interviews were conducted with 27 TGD individuals about their health care experiences. From this, the researchers identified four main themes of unmet expectations: probing, gatekeeping, stigmatizing stance, and misgendering/deadnaming. Steps that can be taken by both the health care provider and the TGD individual to have a more successful encounter are discussed.

Variability and Constancy in Cellular Growth of Arabidopsis Sepals.

Growth of tissues is highly reproducible; yet, growth of individual cells in a tissue is highly variable, and neighboring cells can grow at different rates. We analyzed the growth of epidermal cell lineages in the Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) sepal to determine how the growth curves of individual cell lineages relate to one another in a developing tissue. To identify underlying growth trends, we developed a continuous displacement field to predict spatially averaged growth rates. We showed that this displacement field accurately describes the growth of sepal cell lineages and reveals underlying trends within the variability of in vivo cellular growth. We found that the tissue, individual cell lineages, and cell walls all exhibit growth rates that are initially low, accelerate to a maximum, and decrease again. Accordingly, these growth curves can be represented by sigmoid functions. We examined the relationships among the cell lineage growth curves and surprisingly found that all lineages reach the same maximum growth rate relative to their size. However, the cell lineages are not synchronized; each cell lineage reaches this same maximum relative growth rate but at different times. The heterogeneity in observed growth results from shifting the same underlying sigmoid curve in time and scaling by size. Thus, despite the variability in growth observed in our study and others, individual cell lineages in the developing sepal follow similarly shaped growth curves.

In search of function: nuclear bodies and their possible roles as plant environmental sensors.

Plants must adjust their physiology, development and reproductive decisions in response to a fluctuating environment. Understanding how these adjustments are achieved is fundamental for predicting plant reactions to global environmental changes and for designing mitigation strategies. An often overlooked plant-environmental response is the formation of intranuclear membrane-less organelles known as 'nuclear bodies'. Currently, the functional role of nuclear bodies remains largely unclear. However, in recent years, they have received increased attention as possible hubs or integrators of environmental signals, and for possibly being part of the sensing machinery itself. Here, we will explore the formation of nuclear bodies under changing light, osmotic, and temperature conditions. We will then hypothesize on their potential functions in facilitating environmentally driven plant responses.

The Rise of Transgender and Gender Diverse Representation in the Media: Impacts on the Population.

In recent years, the transgender and gender diverse (TGD) population has gained a stronger voice in the media. Although these voices are being heard, there are limits on the types of TGD representation displayed in media. The current study interviewed 27 TGD individuals. These interviews exposed how participants view the rise of TGD media representation. The main themes that emerged were TGD awareness and TGD identity discovery and role modeling. Clearly, there is a disconnect between transnormativity in the media and transnormativity in reality.

Fluctuations of the transcription factor ATML1 generate the pattern of giant cells in the Arabidopsis sepal.

Multicellular development produces patterns of specialized cell types. Yet, it is often unclear how individual cells within a field of identical cells initiate the patterning process. Using live imaging, quantitative image analyses and modeling, we show that during Arabidopsis thaliana sepal development, fluctuations in the concentration of the transcription factor ATML1 pattern a field of identical epidermal cells to differentiate into giant cells interspersed between smaller cells. We find that ATML1 is expressed in all epidermal cells. However, its level fluctuates in each of these cells. If ATML1 levels surpass a threshold during the G2 phase of the cell cycle, the cell will likely enter a state of endoreduplication and become giant. Otherwise, the cell divides. Our results demonstrate a fluctuation-driven patterning mechanism for how cell fate decisions can be initiated through a random yet tightly regulated process.

Stochasticity in plant cellular growth and patterning.

Plants, along with other multicellular organisms, have evolved specialized regulatory mechanisms to achieve proper tissue growth and morphogenesis. During development, growing tissues generate specialized cell types and complex patterns necessary for establishing the function of the organ. Tissue growth is a tightly regulated process that yields highly reproducible outcomes. Nevertheless, the underlying cellular and molecular behaviors are often stochastic. Thus, how does stochasticity, together with strict genetic regulation, give rise to reproducible tissue development? This review draws examples from plants as well as other systems to explore stochasticity in plant cell division, growth, and patterning. We conclude that stochasticity is often needed to create small differences between identical cells, which are amplified and stabilized by genetic and mechanical feedback loops to begin cell differentiation. These first few differentiating cells initiate traditional patterning mechanisms to ensure regular development.