New for Spring 2011: BCHM 155 Biochemistry Laboratory

This Spring, the Biochemistry Department is offering a new course, BCHM 155 Biochemistry Laboratory to be taught by Prof. Emily Westover.  This lab will meet 6 hours per week and will focus on protein biochemistry.  Students will gain skills to biochemically characterize proteins, including protein purification, enzyme kinetics, and ligand binding.  For part of each module, students will design their own experiments. Students will report their work in written and oral formats.

Spring 2011 course announcement: QBIO 120b — Quantitative Biology Instrumentation Laboratory

Ph.D. students from any science Ph.D. program at Brandeis have the opportunity to enroll in QBIO 120b, the Quantitative Biology Instrumentation Laboratory.  This unique laboratory course, now in its fifth year, was established with funding from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.  The course aims to provide an understanding of modern instruments used in biological research with special emphasis on bright-field and fluorescence light microscopes, spectrophotometers, and fluorimeters.  The approach is a practical one geared to students who are or will be using these instruments in research.  QBIO 120b consists of six two-week long lab projects.  In the initial projects, students assemble optical instruments from their component parts and quantitatively characterize the performance of the instruments.  In the later projects, students apply the understanding gained in the initial projects to getting the optimal performance out of commercial microscopes and fluorimeters and avoiding pitfalls in their use.  The course also covers basic aspects of biological and biochemical sample preparation.

The course is limited by available laboratory space to twelve students.  If you possibly or definitely want to take the QBIO 120 in Spring 2011, please email the instructor, Jeff Gelles (gelles@brandeis.edu) as soon as possible.

The course syllabus can be read online.  Please feel free to contact Prof. Gelles if you have questions.

Re-vamped course for Spring 2011 — PSYC 213a: Social Neuroscience and Culture

This course combines two current topics in Psychology, exploring how the social interactions of humans are processed by the brain and the ways that culture can shape social, as well as cognitive, processes.  Topics include the self, stereotyping, empathy, neuroeconomics, and biculturalism.  In addition to a focus on fMRI research, Dr. Janelle Beadle, a postdoctoral trainee in Neuroscience, will serve as a co-Instructor, lending her expertise in patient research.

Previously taught three years ago as PSYC 180a, this course has been re-listed as a graduate course (although advanced undergraduates are welcome to enroll, pending instructor approval) to allow for more hands-on work, such as the design of cross-cultural research studies.  Prof. Angela Gutchess notes that both social neuroscience and cross-cultural research (and even “cultural neuroscience”, the combination of the two) have grown tremendously in the short time since the course was last offered, and that she is particularly excited to be teaching this course upon return from her semester in Istanbul, Turkey as a Fulbright Scholar.

The Changing Face of Science Reflected in Exciting New Courses

Exciting advances in science are reflected in at least 9 new courses to be offered by the Division of Science. From epigenetics to medicinal enzymology to stem cells to MATLAB, these courses will expose students to some of the frontiers of new knowledge in science.

Details of the courses offered can be found on the following pages

Darwin was a field biologist

ant and treehopper (photo by Dan Perlman)

ant and treehopper (photo by Dan Perlman)

Ok, most Brandeis students don’t get to sail around the world in a wooden boat. On the other hand, over the last several years, Dan Perlman‘s Field Biology classes have produced some very nice field guides about Brandeis and its environs. In honor of Darwin’s birthday, we present:

Field Biology Electronic Field Guides

Categories include: Animals; Trees; Edible, Medicinal, and Useful Plants; Wildflowers; Fungi; Galls

BLAST (2): Computational Biology Course

If you don’t really know what BLAST is, but think you might need to, maybe COSI 178A (Computational Biology) would be a good course for you to take. Prof. Pengyu Hong will be teaching the course in the spring semester.

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