Compatibility and rejection
Open your materials, follow the steps, then turn in your work.
Build a compatibility table and explain how immunosuppression manages rejection.
1. Open your materials
Use the materials named in the first step below. Open lesson resources.
2. Start the work
Read the rejection notes in the PLTW course shell and define rejection and immunosuppression.
Show all 5 required steps
- Read the rejection notes in the PLTW course shell and define rejection and immunosuppression.
- Build a compatibility table ranking donors for one recipient by HLA match.
- Explain why the immune system attacks a poorly matched organ.
- Describe one benefit and one risk of immunosuppression drugs.
- Add your compatibility table to your Unit 4 PLTW tracker evidence.
Lost your place? Reopen today's Compatibility and rejection record. Find the last completed evidence ID, check it against the claim ceiling, and continue with the first unfinished step rather than restarting the whole task.
Check your work before submitting
- You'll be able to rank donors by compatibility for a recipient.
- You'll be able to explain rejection and the trade-offs of immunosuppression.
Before lab work: read the safety rules
- Wear the required PPE, keep the bench clear, handle equipment only as directed, and know where the eyewash, sink, and spill kit are before you start.
- Human samples and data stay private: label with a code, never a name, and dispose of materials in the correct waste container, then wash your hands.
3. Turn in your work
DueCheck Schoology- Hand in
- Compatibility table ranking donors by HLA match score, plus a written immune-rejection explanation and immunosuppression benefit/risk note.
How to submit and name your file
Use the submission route shown on today's today's page.
In Schoology, open your course and the assignment for this lesson. Attach your file, select Submit, and check that it appears in the submission.
PDF upload helpYou get two school days for every day you were absent, so this deadline moves with you.
How this lesson connects
Keep using what you learned last class: Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature. Today: Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature.
Optional: listen or watch a unit review▸
Need help? Warm-up, timing, and directions▸
💡 Big idea: Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature.
- 0-10Read notes; define rejection and
- 10-30Build compatibility table: rank donors by HLA match score for one recipient
- 30-48Explain immune mechanism of for a low-match pair
- 48-62Write one benefit and one risk of drugs
- 62-72Add table to PLTW tracker
- 72-80Class debrief: which donor ranked first and why
- • A transplanted organ is foreign , and the immune system's job is to destroy foreign tissue.
- • Compatibility matching reduces the immune signal; mutes the .
- • Both strategies have limits, and today you quantify those limits with a compatibility table.
- • and mechanisms appear in the Molecular and Genetic Technology domain.
- • T cells recognize foreign HLA antigens on donor cells and mount a cytotoxic .
- • Immunosuppressive drugs reduce T-cell activity broadly, which prevents but leaves patients infection-prone.
- • The goal is the minimum that prevents while preserving enough immunity to fight pathogens.
PLTW connection and today's work
Open Activity 4.3.2 Finding a Match in myPLTW and build a compatibility table ranking donors by HLA match score for one recipient.
Today's stopping point: Simulation data table should be done (Wednesday); compatibility table and immunosuppression notes due today.
PLTW activity titles identify the course connection. If your account will not open, use the posted materials for today and tell Mr. Mendoza. Do not mark an online activity complete unless you completed it.
Use the turn-in directions at the top of this page. Do not create a second submission unless your teacher asks for one.
Show another explanation or a smaller first step
Need help? Choose a starting point
Finish the assigned lab safely before starting extra practice.
Lesson resources: reading, slides, and vocabulary▸
The deck carries the prior idea forward, lets you inspect an analogy, maps the rule to biology, and ends with the same evidence decision and exit ticket used on this page.
Generated from this lesson's canonical data with a red-team citation check.
Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature.
Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature.
A review board sorts scientific evidence, stakeholder needs, possible benefits, possible burdens, and uncertainty before choosing a policy.
- Which statements are scientific evidence?
- Which statements express a value or priority?
- Who receives the benefit and who carries the burden?
Use science to estimate consequences, then state the value judgment and tradeoff that determine the decision.
A review-board model organizes reasoning but does not make one ethical principle automatically outweigh every other principle.
- • Evidence cards map to source-backed findings.
- • Stakeholder cards map to affected people and priorities.
- • The recommendation maps to an explicit tradeoff with a named uncertainty.
Driving question: Build a compatibility table and explain how manages .
What you already know: Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature.
New idea: Organ-replacement decisions integrate organ function, compatibility, urgency, expected benefit, risks, and organ-specific allocation rules rather than relying on one laboratory value or matching feature.
Visual or model: F1. F1. A lesson illustration or teaching diagram for Compatibility and rejection. Use it with E1-E3; it is a model or context image, not experimental or patient data. What to notice: Trace the labeled testing, treatment, or biological process and identify where evidence limits the decision.
- Observe or measure the relevant feature in today's lesson.
- Organize the observation with a stable evidence ID.
- Apply this rule: Use science to estimate consequences, then state the value judgment and tradeoff that determine the decision.
- Choose the option the evidence supports and state the limit of the conclusion.
Real biomedical example: Today the medical interventions team uses Compatibility and to make a bounded evidence decision. A classroom simulation omits many clinical and allocation variables and cannot rank or recommend care for real patients.
What the evidence supports: E1-E3 and F1 support the daily take-home when the response meets the stated success criteria.
What it cannot prove: The package does not support claims beyond this lesson's or any real patient diagnosis.
- • : The kidney's microscopic filtering unit that cleans the blood, reabsorbs needed substances, and forms urine.
- • : A process that filters waste and excess fluid from blood across a semipermeable membrane, used clinically when the kidneys cannot do this job.
- • HLA: Human antigens, proteins on cell surfaces that mark cells as self, helping the immune system spot foreign cells and guiding transplant matching.
- • : A lab test that checks whether a recipient's immune system will attack a donated organ by mixing recipient serum with donor cells.
- • : The immune system's attack on a transplanted organ or that it recognizes as foreign rather than part of the body.
- • : A reduced ability of the immune system to fight infection, caused by disease, medication, or treatment such as after an organ transplant.
Use it now: Choose one decision option. Cite E1 and E3, then explain how the rule connects the evidence to your choice.
Go further, optional: The source links below are optional enrichment. Every fact required for today's local evidence decision appears in this lesson package.
Health Resources and Services Administration is the source this lesson's claim is checked against: How Organ Allocation Works
Limit: A classroom simulation omits many clinical and allocation variables and cannot rank or recommend care for real patients.
Use science to estimate consequences, then state the value judgment and tradeoff that determine the decision.
Limit: A review-board model organizes reasoning but does not make one ethical principle automatically outweigh every other principle.
You can rank donors by compatibility for a recipient.
Limit: E3 defines the classroom product or success criterion. It is not independent scientific evidence and cannot justify a clinical or causal claim.
PLTW-GEND-2026-12-16 · Simulated classroom evidence scenario
Your role: medical interventions team member
Decision: Your team must decide what the evidence from today's lesson supports before submitting the labeled and result claim named on today's page.
- • Build the ranking from compatibility, urgency, and expected benefit, then explain the trade-offs creates for the recipient.
- • Rank donors by the table alone, since a neat compatibility chart already shows who the best match is.
- • Ask for the organ-specific allocation rules before ranking real patients, because a compatibility table never contains those rules.
Response: State one choice, cite at least two evidence IDs, explain the rule that connects them, and add one limitation. Submit it as the labeled and result claim.
Claim ceiling: Today's evidence supports a classroom claim about today's lesson. It cannot prove causation, diagnose a real patient, or justify action outside this room.
Reason for review: Your team must decide what the evidence from today's lesson supports before submitting the labeled and result claim named on today's page.
Context: Today the medical interventions team uses Compatibility and to make a bounded evidence decision. A classroom simulation omits many clinical and allocation variables and cannot rank or recommend care for real patients.
- • T1: Read the notes in the PLTW course shell and define rejection and .
- • T2: Build a compatibility table ranking donors for one recipient by HLA match.
- • T3: Explain why the immune system attacks a poorly matched organ.
- • T4: Describe one benefit and one risk of drugs.
- • T5: Add your compatibility table to your Unit 4 PLTW tracker evidence.
- • E1: Health Resources and Services Administration is the source this lesson's claim is checked against: How Organ Allocation Works
- • E2: Use science to estimate consequences, then state the value judgment and tradeoff that determine the decision.
- • E3: You can rank donors by compatibility for a recipient.
Measurements: Use only the measurements, units, graph, or counts supplied in today's task. No additional patient measurement is implied.
Figure finding: Teaching diagram for Compatibility and . Trace the labeled testing, treatment, or biological process and identify where evidence limits the decision. This is a teaching model, not patient or experimental data.
Uncertainty: This is a composite classroom scenario. Missing history, measurements, or confirmation tests remain unknown and limit the conclusion.
Rate or percent = part / comparison total x 100%. Percent change = (new - comparison) / comparison x 100%.
If 18 of 60 records meet a condition, the frequency is 18 / 60 x 100% = 30%.
Name the comparison total. A percent describes the supplied group and does not automatically predict an individual's outcome.
Use today's supplied counts to calculate one rate, risk, frequency, or percent change. Show the denominator and interpretation.
Students often think A polished answer about Compatibility and is trustworthy even when its evidence source, comparison, or limitation is missing.. The trap: Presentation quality cannot raise the evidence level. A classroom simulation omits many clinical and allocation variables and cannot rank or recommend care for real patients.
Recipient: patient M. Donors ranked best to worst by HLA match:
- Donor 2: 6 of 6 match, crossmatch negative = rank 1 (best)
- Donor 1: 4 of 6 match, crossmatch negative = rank 2
- Donor 3: 2 of 6 match, crossmatch weak positive = rank 3 (worst)
Why a poor match is attacked (my words): Immune cells read the HLA markers on the donor kidney. When too many markers look foreign, T cells and antibodies treat the organ like an invader and attack its blood vessels and cells, which is rejection.
Immunosuppression:
- Benefit: The drugs calm the immune attack so even a good-but-not-perfect match can survive and keep filtering.
- Risk: A dialed-down immune system fights infections and some cancers less well, so the patient is more vulnerable to getting sick.
(Tip: a higher match number plus a negative crossmatch is what you want; ranking is not just the match count, the crossmatch can overrule it.)
This model shows the level of evidence and organization needed to complete: Builds a table ranking candidate donors for one recipient by HLA match score, then explains in the student's own words why a poorly matched organ is attacked and gives one benefit and one risk of immunosuppression.
- Name the variables and include units.
- Enter observations without changing the raw values.
- Check labels, calculations, and patterns before interpreting the data.
Keep the structure. Replace the question, facts, measurements, and evidence. Then recheck units, vocabulary, and whether the conclusion goes beyond the evidence.
Also due today: turns in the compatibility table on Schoology under today's data-table assignment.
- CER:
- Claim, Evidence, Reasoning: make a claim, back it with evidence, explain your reasoning.
- SOP:
- Standard Operating Procedure, the exact steps to follow (especially in a lab).
- Tracker:
- Your PLTW progress log where you record completed evidence.
- myPLTW:
- The PLTW course site where you do the online activities. Find it in Clever with your Microsoft sign-in, right next to Schoology.
Tap the speaker to hear a term. Add two of these to your notebook glossary with a definition and an example in your own words.
Pick just 2 or 3 words from today and make them yours: write what each one means in your own words, name the context clue or evidence that helped, then give one example from what you actually did in Compatibility and rejection. Try your own words first; the glossary is there if you get stuck. This is voluntary and counts as extra credit, so keep it short.
Saved on this device. Show Mr. Mendoza or add these to your notebook glossary to claim the extra credit.
Classroom documents for this lesson are posted in Schoology. Open Clever, then Schoology, and find each one by the name shown on its card.
Use this for optional reserve or extra-credit work after the required class lesson is complete.
Placement rationale
Matched Transplant matching and allocation ethics by path:Medical-Interventions/Unit-4_When-Organs-Fail/4.3_Transplant; keywords:transplant, hla, allocation, organ. Score 158. Visibility: student-schoology (student-facing resource; link through Schoology rather than local path).
Use this for optional reserve or extra-credit work after the required class lesson is complete.
Placement rationale
Matched Transplant matching and allocation ethics by path:Medical-Interventions/Unit-4_When-Organs-Fail/4.3_Transplant; keywords:transplant, allocation, organ. Score 146. Visibility: student-schoology (student-facing resource; link through Schoology rather than local path).
Use this for optional reserve or extra-credit work after the required class lesson is complete.
Placement rationale
Matched Transplant matching and allocation ethics by path:Medical-Interventions/Unit-4_When-Organs-Fail/4.3_Transplant; keywords:transplant, allocation, organ. Score 146. Visibility: student-schoology (student-facing resource; link through Schoology rather than local path).
Sign in to Clever with your district Microsoft account to open Schoology or myPLTW. Follow today's posted steps. If myPLTW will not open, use the posted alternative and tell Mr. Mendoza. Turn in your completed work through the Schoology assignment.
Practice: try a question, then check your answer▸
Claim ceiling for this check: Today's evidence supports a classroom claim about today's lesson. It cannot prove causation, diagnose a real patient, or justify action outside this room.
A student makes a certain conclusion about Compatibility and rejection from one classroom result. What must the student add before the conclusion is defensible?
Write an answer and pick a confidence to unlock the key.
Fast retrieval with instant answers, not the commit-then-reveal check above. Try each from memory first: write what you remember about the earlier units, then check yourself here.
Missed class or ready for more?▸
Run this before you touch the bench. It is built from the real lab procedure, so the decisions you make here are the ones you will make with the equipment in your hands.
I can name the procedure's purpose and the evidence I will record. I can state today's specific hazards and the control for each. If this deck does not name them, I ask Mr. Mendoza before I touch anything. My data table is ready before materials are handled.
Finish the checklist before you handle any material.
- • Wear the required PPE, keep the bench clear, handle equipment only as directed, and know where the eyewash, sink, and spill kit are before you start.
- • Human samples and data stay private: label with a code, never a name, and dispose of materials in the correct waste container, then wash your hands.
- 1Before materials are handled, identify the purpose, variables or comparison, controls, measurement units, and stop-work condition.
- 2Read the rejection notes in the PLTW course shell and define rejection and immunosuppression.
- 3Build a compatibility table ranking donors for one recipient by HLA match.
- 4Explain why the immune system attacks a poorly matched organ.
- 5Describe one benefit and one risk of immunosuppression drugs.
- 6Add your compatibility table to your Unit 4 PLTW tracker evidence.
- 7Record each result in the prepared table before interpreting it. Mark missing, repeated, or invalid results truthfully.
- 8Complete the named cleanup and waste route, remove PPE safely, wash hands when required, and confirm the station is ready for the next group.
| Trial or sample ID | Independent condition | Measured result with units | Observation before interpretation | Quality-control note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Before the procedure, predict the result and cite the rule behind the prediction.
After the procedure, compare the result with the prediction and name one limitation or source of uncertainty.
What today's skills lead to. These are real health-science careers this course builds toward. Tap one to see, on the US Department of Labor's O*NET site, what the job actually involves, what it pays, and how fast it is growing.
Today is individual work you can do from home: complete the same target above, then submit your Data table.
Go to Schoology to turn this in. Submit one PDF. Put your first and last name in the document header. Name the file: FirstName LastName - Assignment Title - YYYY-MM-DD.pdf. If you cannot get in, see Mr. Mendoza. Do not skip the work.
Class still runs. Complete the online activity above (it's self-guided). Need the concept taught without a teacher? Use this authoritative explainer:
MedlinePlus: DialysisYou've passed Unit 2, so the optional extra-credit track is open. Complete reserved-unit work from home, including virtual labs, for extra credit. Each item shows its correct submission route.
Open the extra-credit track- CompleteEvery required part of the artifact is present, nothing left blank.
- AccurateThe science and the data are correct and match the evidence.
- Scientific reasoningYou explain your claim with evidence and reasoning (CER), not just an answer.
- Professional communicationClear, organized, labeled, and written the way a clinician or scientist would.
- SubmittedGo to Schoology to turn this in. Submit one PDF. Put your first and last name in the document header. Name the file: FirstName LastName - Assignment Title - YYYY-MM-DD.pdf. If you cannot get in, see Mr. Mendoza. Do not skip the work.
- Error analysis and method · counts doubleName a specific limit of the method and how it moved your result, and compare what you predicted to what happened. "Human error" does not count; say what about the procedure or instrument caused it.
This week
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