Term:
SPRING 2009
Course No. & Section:
Course Title:
Professor:
BIOL _398__ ____
_
SS: BIOINFORMATICS RSRCH & LAB_
__DR. GARY KULECK_________
_
Course Description (principal topics covered):
Objectives:
The newly emergent disciplines of genomics and bioinformatics deal with studying the structure
of the genome, including the identification and analysis of gene structure. In addition, genomic
sequence information can be used to explore phylogenetic relationships between organisms. The
focus of the tutorial is to train lower division undergraduates to discover (annotation) and
understand gene structure in eukaryotes.
Content:
Students will be involved in a ‘dry bench’ laboratory where they explore the structure of
eukaryotic genomes. Student teams will be assigned ‘chunks’ of DNA (~50 kb) known as fosmids
to annotate (discover new genes) by the end of the semester under the tutelage of faculty and
upper division biology majors as mentors. They must find and precisely locate all of the genes,
associated splice variants and demonstrate that these genes exist in other related species as
validation. The expectation is that students will be able to present their completed work at the
West Coast Biological Sciences Undergraduate Research Conference (WCBSURC) in Spring
2009 ; the completed work will be submitted to the Washington University Genome Sequencing
Center for future publication in international scientific databases with the potential of student
co-authorship.
Prerequisites/Recommended Background:
Students are expected to have taken a minimum of BIOL 202 (Genetics) and BIOL 201 (Cell
Biology),. Students should be familiar with using the internet to gather data for analysis and work.
This course has a goal of completing the annotation of a segment of Drosophila DNA.
Required Texts/References:
No text required.
Course Work/Expectations:
-4 hrs/week minimum attendance in laboratory participation
-progress in completion of the annotation of a fosmid
-project presentation at WCBSURC in the Spring
-various class assignments
Comments:
Can be taken for 1-2-units credit. This course can lead to future undergraduate research
opportunities.