The goals of this course are:

• to familiarize graduate students with important principles and key concepts in contemporary molecular and cellular biology
• to help students develop the skills required to critically evaluate current research publications
• to familiarize students with the experimental techniques utilized to test specific hypotheses.

These goals will be achieved through formal lectures on specific topics and small discussion groups that will focus on evaluation of published research papers (recent or classified). Students are encouraged to ask questions for clarification and to seek out individual faculty members for additional assistance when needed.

Students are expected to attend all lectures and assigned discussion groups. Attendance at the weekly review sessions are optional; however, they are designed to enhance the learning experience through an open discussion with the course teaching assistants. Scheduling conflicts should be discussed with Jackie Bickenbach, PhD in advance.

All students will participate in a small group with a faculty member serving as a Facilitator. Each week, a research paper will be assigned by the Instructors, and each paper will be made available one week in advance of the discussion section.  The Instructors may also provide optional review papers that will provide additional background information.  All papers will be made available electronically as an Adobe Acrobat PDF file. 

Students will be expected to read and evaluate each assigned paper in advance and to prepare a short report that will be due at the start of the discussion section each week (12 total).  No late reports will be accepted. These written reports will be a maximum length of 1 page (single-spaced). Each report will be worth a total of 5 points as outlined below (total of 60 points). Students will be expected to attend all small group meetings and discuss the assigned papers. Discussion will be worth a total of 40 points over the semester. Students will be penalized 5 points for each unexcused absence.

Reports should address the following points:

1) Hypothesis:

What was the author’s idea (question, theory, model, etc) before they started the study?
Frequently not included in the title.  Title is more often a conclusion of the study.
Usually find the hypothesis in the introduction, typically in the 2nd half of the intro.

2) Select a key experiment:

This would be an experiment that tests the hypothesis. The experiment should result in an answer that either supports or refutes the hypothesis.

3) How does it test the hypothesis?

Explain what was done in the experiment to either prove or disprove the hypothesis.

4) What were the controls?    (positive and negative)

Positive controls usually test if the methodology is working.  If you do an experiment and the parameter you measure doesn’t change is it because your treatment had no effect or because your experimental system isn’t working?  Positive controls often employ something previously shown to alter the parameter you are measuring and confirm that your experimental system is working.

Negative controls are usually used to account for all variables in the system other than the one you are testing.  They are used to determine whether any of these other variables produce a change. When negative, they show that changes in measured parameters can be attributed to your specific treatment.  Negative controls should include everything in the system that might change in your experimental samples except what you are testing.

Q: Are they adequate?  A: Do they meet the above requirements?

5) What do the authors infer from these data?

These are the conclusions that the authors derive from their results