BIOC 442BIOCHEMISTRY (III)
This is a class taught by two professors: Dr. Kimelman and Dr. Ruohola-Baker. Overall, I think the material of the class was interesting although I had previously perhaps half of the material in BIOL355. This class was a lot more memorization-heavy than the honors biochemistry classes. Students were expected to memorize pathways and specific examples and then regurgitate that information on the exam. Before each exam I spent 20-30 hours re-writing all the notes, creating an index for easy access on the exams, and working through all the past exams. Attached as my artifact is a map of molecular mechanisms that I created for exam 2. Although we learned the mechanisms separately in the class, questions often asked about how a change in one pathway could affect another due to a shared molecule. As such, this mechanism map links all the mechanisms together so that each molecule is connected to all the different mechanisms we learned about previously. There were a few iterations of the map before I was able to put it concisely on paper and ensure that it was organized but my final version was very useful for scenarios in which the mechanisms link together.
bioc 402FUNCTIONAL GENOMICS
This class is meant to be a lab class that had to be adapted to an online format at the last minute. Generally, I would consider it successful. Each week we covered a few different topics in lecture, read and summarized a scientific article that used the techniques, and had a quiz about the techniques at the end of the week. We also essentially held a journal club prior to the quiz and discussed the assigned paper to pull out important points. On a few of the days we had a practical exercise that we did either alone or followed along with the professor. Overall I would consider the class successful in teaching us about the different techniques and possible shortcomings. Obviously none of us actually gained any laboratory experience, but this class did the best it could online and I think the quizzes were good for ensuring that we actually understood the techniques.
As an artifact I have attached the week 10 exercise. We worked with Fiji, a software that I had not previously used, to analyze a Western blot and confocal microscopy images. I was excited to work with the software and learned a lot about how to use the software. The software was able to quantify protein amounts through using the darkness and size of the band on the Western blot, which was interesting. The confocal images were used to determine the localization of different molecules in a Giardia trophozoite and the Western blot data informed the researchers whether the protein of interest had been knocked down in the experimental model, as was desired. BIOL 405CELLULAR AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY OF HUMAN DISEASE
My favorite part of this class was probably all the material that Dr. Wakimoto covered as a part of the class. We looked at different molecular mechanisms behind genetically-coded human diseases and read The Forever Fix by Ricki Lewis which chronicles the field of gene therapy (and I learned I enjoy scientific journalism). As part of a group project I was assigned to look at the current field for Alzheimer's disease, which I also hope to research as a graduate student. Through the class I learned a lot about different diseases, mechanisms, patient experiences, and how to read scientific literature regarding the molecular basis of disease, all of which will be important in the future for me. We were also informed about Special Books for Special Kids (SBSK), a YouTube channel created by an ex-teacher for students with disabilities or cognitive differences. He interviews people in the "disability/neurodiversity community" so that they can tell people their perspective and help foster understanding overall. I would highly recommend these videos. I have attached an assignment for the group project as my artifact. We each read two recent papers in the field and were asked to concisely summarize and relate them in an abstract. The articles and assignments leading up to this abstract took me 15-20 hours prior to this abstract. This assignment is the culmination of all the work in the class.
Envir 280NATURAL HISTORY OF THE PUGET SOUND REGION
I signed up for this class to fulfill the natural history/biodiversity requirements of the biology major and expected it to be moderately fun since it had a couple overnight field-trips as part of the course. Since the course was online, the field-trips were completely nixed but this course was the most enjoyable class I had taken all year. Prior to the class I had very little knowledge about the biodiversity of the region, even though I grew up here. As a part of the class I learned about the history of the region, along with the plants and birds native to the area. On the weekends, I enjoyed traipsing all over Seattle to find glacial erratics. Now, I have learned a lot about the different natural areas in or near Seattle and have traveled to many, including Discovery Park, Ravenna Park, and Leschi Park. I've also gained a new hobby! I used to mainly walk through nature completely oblivious to the wildlife around me. Now, I have become invested in birdwatching and will continue to do so beyond the quarter. The main picture at the top of this page is one I took at Marymoor Park of a great blue heron nesting there and I've taken many pictures besides that. The artifact I have included is the nature blog that I wrote in as a part of the class. Each week we would go back to a journal site near us and chronicle changes in plant life, animal life, and anything else we were interested in. My journal is full of my observations, along with photographs, drawings, and paintings of the wildlife and plant life that I saw. There are also posts regarding my extra credit assignments, which include the erratic hunt and the land-use history of the area I used for my journal site.
To Autumn 2020 |