ENROLL

Marta P. Lyons

Environmental problems are caused by a complex mix of physical, biological, social, economic, political, and technological factors. This course explores how these environmental problems affect life on Earth by examining the biological processes underlying natural ecological systems and the effects of global environmental changes such as resources consumption and overharvesting, land-use change, climate warming, pollution, extinction and biodiversity loss, and invasive species.

Prerequisite: One introductory science lab course (Biology 125, 126, Chemistry 123, 128, Geology 110, 115 or 120)

Sophomore Priority

Waitlist for Juniors and Seniors: BIOL 210.WL0 (Synonym 47720)

Rika Anderson

The advent of next-generation sequencing technology has revolutionized biology, enabling transformative breakthroughs in fields ranging from agriculture to conservation to medicine. In this course, students will gain experience with the computational and bioinformatics tools needed to analyze “big data,” including sequence searching and alignment, assembly, gene calling and annotation. Students will learn to ask and answer their own scientific questions using sequence data, and to critically assess the conclusions other genomics and bioinformatics studies. No prior computer programming experience is required. Associated laboratory will focus on wet lab methods for DNA/RNA extraction and preparation as well as computational analysis.

Prerequisite: Biology 125 and 126 and one of these upper level courses: Biology 240, Biology 321 or Biology 350 and concurrent registration in Biology 339

Biology 339 required

Gisel Flores-Montoya

Prerequisite: Psychology 110

Kristin Bloomer