info
    "General Biology" is intended for non-biology majors, and can be used to fill a Group D breadth requirement in the natural sciences at the University of Delaware. It is a three credit course, which does NOT have a laboratory. Students who wish to take a biology course with a laboratory to fill a breadth requirement MUST TAKE BISC104, which has an associated lab.
 

• The focus of the course will be THE CELL, which is the basic building block of all living things. Understanding how cells are built and how they work yields important information about ALL living things.
• We will also learn how living things deal with INFORMATION. How do they know what they are and what they can do? How do they pass this information on to the next generation of cells or to the next generation of organisms?
• Current knowledge of these areas will allow the student to better comprehend the many important issues in modern life which involve biology. We will look at MODERN  APPLICATIONS of biological information, such as genetic (DNA) analysis, cloning of animals, and other issues; which impact us all as individuals, family members, and as members of society.
• By reading biologically oriented news articles, written for non-scientists, students can turn this course into the beginning of a life-long study of biology. Therefore the professor hopes to provoke your interest in - and excitement about - this wonderful system called LIFE, and to motivate your CONTINUING SELF-EDUCATION.

  Periodically during the semester activities will be done, often in small groups of five students, which require the students to apply their knowledge of biology to real life situations. This "problem-based learning" or "case study" mode of teaching produces excellent assimilation of material, and will allow the class to explore societal issues and opinions, as well as biological concepts.
    Assignments will be given during the semester to enhance concepts introduced in lecture or to encourage the student's independent study of some particular areas not covered in lecture. These assignments may have a written component done outside of class and handed in at class, or the instructor may ask the students to write about or answer questions about the assignment (a "quick-check") in the next class period.

  It is expected that students will attend the class except when absent due to (1) serious (documented) illness, (2) documented family tragedy,or (3) absence from campus due to official University of Delaware business. Attendance will be determined by participation in small group activities or by other means.
    Because of the 15% of the grade which will be associated with attendance, assignments (and the results that are turned in), and activities done in class, it is imperative that students make a committment to attend class, except when it is impossible due to any of the three excuses listed above.

    Academic dishonesty in any form will not be tolerated, and will be dealt with severely. Please become familiar with the University's policy as stated in the Student Handbook under the heading of "Academic Dishonesty."
 
 

  BISC103syllabus.html#cal

Please note: The schedule of topics below MAY change. The examination dates will ALWAYS BE THE SAME as shown on the schedule, so that students can rely on these dates in their schedule.  The CONTENT OF EXAMINATIONS will be announced in one week prior to the exam.
 
 

DATE	TOPIC	CHAPTER
Sept.  4            6	What is Biology?  It's Alive!	1
Sept.  9          11          13	Building Cells  More About Cells  Even More About Cells!	4
Sept.16          18          20	Amazing Membranes  The Ins and Outs of Cells  Small Groups: Getting Together	4
Sept. 23           25           27	Small Groups: Problem-Based Learning  Cell Signalling  Neurotransmitters	4
Sept. 30  Oct.  2          4	Neurotransmitters and Drugs  EXAMINATION 1  What are Genes?	Contents announced 1 week prior  9
Oct.  7           9          11	Replication of Genes  How Genes Express Themselves  More about Gene Expression	9
Oct. 14          16          18	Control Over Gene Expression  Stem Cells and Cloning  Small Groups: Problem-Based Learning	10
Oct. 21          23          25	Asexual, Cellular Reproduction  Cancer: Cells Out of Control  Small Groups: Problem-Based Learning	7
Oct. 28          30  Nov.  1	Sex...Why?  Sex...How?  EXAMINATION 2	7  Contents announced 1 week prior
Nov.  4            6            8	Inheritance: A Few Simple Rules  Inheritance in Higher Organisms  More about Inheritance	8
Nov. 11           13           15	Beyond the Basics of Inheritance  Human Genetics  Human Genetic Disease	8
Nov. 18           20           22	Small Groups: Genetics Problems  DNA Technology  Tools for Manipulating DNA	11
Nov. 25           27           29	Forensic DNA Tests  Review  THANKSGIVING RECESS!	11
Dec.  2           4           6	Modern Applications in Biology  More New Biology  Even More New Biology	TBA
Dec. 9         11	Review  Evaluation
December 13 to December 20	FINAL EXAMINATION	No early examinations will be given

Campbell, Neil A. and Jane B. Reece, Essential Biology, 1/e, Addison Wesley Longman, Inc. San
        Francisco, 2001

Campbell, Neil A. and Jane B. Reece, CD-ROM and Website, Essential Biology Place. CD-ROM
      and access to the website included with each new text. Access to the website can be purchased
      on line.
 
 

Zalisco, Edward J., Student Study Guide for Essential Biology, Addison Wesley Longman, Inc. San
     Francisco, 2001
 
 

University of Delaware list of resources for biology: a great place to start

The National Institutes of Health: center for health and medical information and research for the United States

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention: keeps records of disease and patterns of disease in the United States

In general, the exam material will be from the lectures and "problems" from class,  through Friday, Sept. 27. Material on the same topics in your text will enhance your understanding, as will work you can do using the CD-ROM/website for the text or the printed Student Study Guide.

1. What are the properties of living things? Can any of them be properties of non-living things?
2. What are the different levels in the hierarchy of organization of life? Which structure in the hierarchy is considered the "unit of life"?
3. What is meant by life's unity? What is meant by life's diversity? How did this diversity develop?
4. Grouping organisms by their relatedness has produced two schemes of Kingdoms and Domains. How are the two schemes related to one another? If we use the groups called Kingdoms, how would they be distributed into Domains?
5. What are the Big Six elements, and what is special about them with respect to living systems?
6. What are the major features of a prokaryotic cell? Explain the diferences between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells.
7. What is the endomembrane system? Describe the structure and function of the endomembrane system, the rough and smooth endoplasmic reticulum, the Golgi apparatus, lysosomes, vesicles and vacuoles, the midria, and the chloroplasts.
8. What is the function of a cell wall?
9. Explain the structure and function of the nucleus.
10. How does the secretory pathway work to make and secrete products of the cell?
11. How would mitochondria and chloroplasts have been generated through endosymbiosis/  How would the structures in prokaryotic cells, which participate in cellular respiration and photosynthesis, have evolved into structures in mitochondria and chloroplasts?
12. How do enzymes work? Explain this step-by-step.
13. What is the form of energy needed by a cell? Describe the structure of this energy source. What do cells and organisms use this energy for?
14. What is the structure of a phospholipid bilayer?
15. What is the difference between hydrophobic and hydrophilic materials? Draw a lipid bilayer, and mention which parts are hydrophobic and which are hydrophilic.
16. What is a major difference between the OUTSIDE of the plasma membrane and the INSIDE?
17. What is diffusion? How is it related to passive transport of material into and out of a cell? What materials are transported by "simple diffusion" through the lipid of the plasma membrane? What other types of passive transport are there?
18. What is osmosis?
19. Describe the sequence of events occurring during the operation of active transport by the sodium-potassium pump. What are the results of the operation of this pump?
20. Describe the processes of endocytosis and exocytosid. What types of material are typically brought into a eukaryotic cell by pinocytosis and by phagocytosis?
21. What does penicillin do to bacteria?
22. What are proteins made of? On what does the function of protein depend? Where are the instructions for making proteins?
23. Compare the properties of viruses like TMV and adenovirus and a cell.
24. How does a neuron transmit a nerve impulse through its plasma membrane?
25. How does a neuron transmit a signal to another cell across a synaptic cleft?
 
 

Fill in the blanks

1. Depression is associated with a low level of ______________ in the brain.
2. RNA contains the bases __, __, __, and __. DNA contains the bases __, __, __, and __.
3. In 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick discovered "The _________ Helix" and one of the features of this structure was that the amount of ____ was equal to the amount of T.
4. The parental DNA molecule contains the following bases. Fill in the bases of the daughter strand.
                 TCAGAATG
                ___________
5. Genetic information in a _________is encoded in the nucleotide sequence of it DNA molecule.
6. Transcription is the transfer of genetic information from ________ to ___________.
7. One stop codon in mRNA is _____, and the start codon is _________.
8. The enzyme ______________ attaches to the ___________of the gene, causing the start of transcription.
9. The non-coding regions of an RNA transcript are called _______, and the coding regions are______.
10._________________ converts three-letter codons in mRNA to the corresponding amino acid words for protein.
11. A molecule that carries an amino acid and can recognize an mRNA codon is _________________.
12. Translation takes place in the _________.
13. An egg and a sperm fuse to become a __________.
14. Most regulation of gene expression occurs at the __________________ level.
15. DNA packing is done in the following manner: histones attach to _______ to form_______. They coil into a ______________, which coils into a 200nm diameter ____________. Further looping and folding compacts the DNA into a _________________________.
16. When genes are turned "on" in transcriptional control,  __________ can bind to the ___________.
17. Stem cells can be removed from a(n)_____________, a(n)__________, or a(n)_______________.
18.___________is given to a person to suppress his _________ system which could reject a foreign tissue after transplantation.
19. A clone of an adult is made by putting a ___________ into the donor egg, whose _______ has been removed.
20. _____________reproduction is done by single-celled organisms.
21. Cell division by mitosis plays an important role in __________ or ________ of cells in a multicellular organism.
22. Duplicated chromosomes are held together at the constriction known as the ___________.
23. In mitosis, the duplicated ___________ divide and are evenly distributed to form two _________.
24. In prophase, the ____________disappears, the ___________become compact and the __________ forms to move the chromosomes around.
25. Interphase includes the phases of the cell cycle known as ___, ____, and ___ (in the order in which they occur).

True/False Questions If the following statements are false, correct them.
1. DNA polymerase makes the bonds between the nucleotides to form a new strand of DNA.
2. Protein synthesis takes place in the nucleus.
3. Translation is the transfer of genetic information in the DNA into a protein.
4. Translation converts nucleic acid language into protein language.
5. In prokaryotic cells, transcription and translation take place in different compartments of the cell.
6. In transcription in a single gene, only one of the DNA strands serves as a template for the newly forming RNA.
7. In transcription, a promoter sequence signals the DNA polymerase to stop transcribing.
8. Before an RNA leaves the nucleus, the exons are removed and the introns are spliced together.
9.Translation takes place on a ribosome.
10. Regulation of genes is involved in the differenciation of cells.
11. In a human body cell, there are 23 chromosomes in the nucleus.
12. DNA packing can prevent gene expression.
13. Stem cells can be removed from the bone marrow of a young person.
14. A homologous pair of chromosomes can have 8 copies of that type of chromosome, i.e., the #1 chromosome.
15. Before a cell divides, it makes two copies of each chromosome it has.
16. Cytokinesis usually begins after mitosis is completed.
17. Anaphase is the stage when chromosomes line up in the middle of the cell.
18. Telophase is quite similar to prophase.
19. Mitosis takes place in the M phase.
20. An external signal is needed at the G₁-checkpoint to carry on the cell cycle into S phase.

The exam material starts with the second lecture on neurotransmitters and covers the discussion of neurotransmitters and conditions and diseases. It ends after the lecture material on asexual reproductions and the brief coverage of cancer.
1. What is the relationship between the "substantia nigra," the "basal ganglia," and the motor neurons that connect to muscle cells? How is this relationship disturbed in Parkinson's disease, and how can Parkinson's disease be treated? What is the defect in Huntington's disease and what are the symptoms of this disease? What abnormality is there in neurotransmitters and schizophrenia and how is it treated?
2. What is the basic block in the brain which produces depression? What neurotransmitter shows very low levels in the brain after suicide as a result of depression? What are the two ways you can increase the level of a number of neurotransmitters in the brain to treat depression?
3. What are opiates and what is there affect on the brain? What natural substances, produced by your body, are bound to opiate receptors? What is the effect of THC on the brain?
4. Using the "mind equals brain" paradigm, how would one define "addiction," and what sorts of substances would be capable of causing addiction?
5. What was The Blender Experiment that was carried out in 1952, and what did it establish in the minds of scientists? How was the experiment carried out and what was labeled with radioactive sulphur and with radioactive phorphorus?
6. What are the subunits of nucleic acids, how are they put together to form a chain, and what are the names of the "bases" which extend from these chains in DNA and in RNA? Who described the structure of DNA and how did they figure this out? What is the structure of DNA, and how did the structure suggest the means by which the molecule could copy itself (replicate)? What is semi-conservative replication of DNA and what enzyme carries it out? What are complementary base pairs and how are they used to associate two chains of nucleotides?
7. How would you diagram the "Central Dogma"? Make a diagram and label replication, transcription, RNA synthesis, translation, and protein synthesis. What are the two steps in "expression" of a gene in DNA?
8. How does RNA polymerase interact with DNA and make a complementary strand of RNA? What is the part of DNA called where RNA polymerase attaches? Describe how, in prokaryotic cells, mRNA can be made and read at the same time. Why isn't this possible in eukaryotic cells? What happens to the RNA transcript in a eukaryotic cell during RNA processing in order to turn it into mRNA? What are introns and what are exons? What is meant by a "cap" and a "tail"?
9. Describe the process of protein synthesis or translation. Why is it called translation? What are the two languages you are working with during this process, and what is the "dictionary" used to translate one into the other? What are the stop codons and what is the start codon? Make up a piece of mRNA with a start codon and a stop codon and about five other codons inbetween. Translate it.
10. What structures and other molecules are part of the protein synthesizing machinery? How does tRNA help to connect nucleic acid codons with amino acids going into a growing protein chain? What does a ribosome attached to an mRNA molecule do after a bond is made between two amino acids? What happens next? You might want to use the CD-ROM or the website to see some animations of this process.
11. What is sickle cell anemia and how does it cause symptoms? What are some of the symptoms?
What is the molecular basis of sickle cell anemia? What is the difference between the normal hemoglobin gene and the sickle cell hemoglobin gene? What is the difference between normal hemoglobin protein and sickle cell hemoglobin protein?
12. What is differenciation? What kinds of gene regulation are most important in eukaryotic cells?
13. What are the different levels of organization of DNA and proteins in eukaryotic DNA, and when is DNA available for expression, and what level of packing makes DNA unavailable for expression?
14. How many human genes are present in a typical specialized cell in a human being? What percentage of the human genome is active in a specialized cell in a human being? What is the default conditions of most genes in a human cell? What is the most common way to turn on a gene in a eukaryotic cell? What role do transcription factors play? What process is turned on to turns on gene expression? How are genes turned on through a signal transduction pathway?
15. What are stem cells and why are they thought to hold so much promise in the future of medicine?
What are the sources of embryonic stem cells? Remember the story of Molly who received stem cells from the umbilical cord of her brother Adam. Do you believe in creating embryos for research...for therapeutic use of the stem cells...for reproduction and selection of a more desirable offspring?
What diseases might be treated by implanting stem cells? What does the immune system do to tissues that are foreign, and what drug can prevent this? How can cloning an embryo get around this problem with the immune system? If you need a heart transplant in 20 years, do you think that scientists could make a heart for you...from you?
16. What is asexual reproduction and what organisms use it to make new organisms and what organisms use it to grow and replace lost cells?
17. What are the chromosomes in eukaryotic cells like before the cell starts into mitosis?What are the 4 phases of mitosis and what happens in each phase? Do you understand WHY these complicated processes go on? Think about dividing 46 structures in half and putting half of them in one pile and half in another pile. It takes organization and control.
18. What is cytokinesis, and how is it carried out in a typical animal cell and in a typical plant cell?
19. Between one cell division and the next cell division is a part of the cell's life called interphase. What three parts is interphase usually broken into? What is the sequence of these phases of the cell cycle? In what way is the cell cycle analogous to an automatic clothes washer? What is the G1-checkpoint and where does it come in the cell cycle? What three groups of cells are there with respect to their behavior in the cell cycle? Where are neurons in the cycle? What about a liver cell? Which of these can be signalled to return to the cycle, and how is that done? Diagram the events that occur in a cell when a growth factor gives a cell the signal that it should go past the G1-checkpoint and start to replicate its DNA. What happens to the growth factor? How is the signal transduced through the cell to the nucleus (using the signal transduction pathway)? What happens in the nucleus to turn on one or more genes? After the genes are turned on, what happens, what is made using these genes?
20. What are the two properties of malignant (cancer) cells? What feature is missing in cells of a benign tumor? What is metastasis? How does it affect the patient's survival and treatment? What route does the tumor cell usually take during metastasis? What is a primary tumor and a secondary tumor?

Good luck!! Have a sane and happy Halloween...if only because you have an exam the next day!

1. What are the two ways that sexual reproduction causes the mixing and shuffling of genes?
What is meiosis and what does it produce? How can you connect meiosis and Mendel's Principle of Segregation? What are the phases in meiosis I and meiosis II? When do homologous pairs of chromosomes come together? What is synapsis and crossing over?  When do homologous pairs of chromosomes separate? What is the meaning of a cell being diploid? What does it mean if a cell is haploid? In the human life cycle, where are there diploid cells and where are there haploid cells?
2. What is nondisjunction, and what genetic condition is fairly common, particularly in offspring of mothers over 35 years old, that is caused by nondisjunction? What is the technical name for Down syndrome, and what are some of the symptoms?
3. Review Mendel's "monohybrid cross." What is meant by dominant and recessive traits, homozygous and heterozygous, the Principle of Segregation, a parental cross, an F₁ cross, F₂ generation, genotype and phenotype? How can you use symbols to represent the genes (alleles) in an organism or in a gamete? How can you use a Punnett square to represent the offspring produced by any particular cross?
4. What is a testcross and why would you do it? How would you determine that the parent with the dominant phenotype was homozygous or heterozygous?
5. What is a dihybrid cross? Assuming the two genes you are following are independently assorting, what is the phenotypic ratio of the offspring of two dihybrids, i.e., AaBb x AaBb? What does it mean if two genes are independently assorting? What does it mean when two genes are "linked"?
6. What is incomplete dominance? How can you tell by looking at the homozygous parents and the heterozygotes that there is incomplete dominance? What happens when you analyze a person's cells who is heterozygous for human hypercholesterolemia (Figure 8.20)? Why is this incomplete dominance?
7. The ABO bloodtypes in humans show multiple alleles and codominance. What are the possible genotypes for the blood types A, B, O, and AB? What alleles are dominant to "i" and what alleles are codominant?
8. What is polygenic inheritance? If you graph a trait that is polygenic, like human height, what kind of variation do you get? What is a "normal distribution"?
9. What are positive features of a genetic "system" to study? How do human beings compare to these features, and how does this change the study of human genetics as opposed to that of fruit flies?
10. What is the most usual pattern of inheritance in human genetic disease? What is a carrier? What mating is bound to produce offspring with genetic disease, even though both parents are normal in phenotype? What is cystic fibrosis, Tay-Sachs disease, sickle cell anemia, and PKU? What advantage can a person have who is heterozygous for sickle cell anemia (has sickle cell trait)? Why would the hemoglobin alleles for normal hemoglobin and sickle cell hemoglobin be called codominant?
11. What diseases are passed on to offspring by dominant inheritance? What proportion of offspring with one affected parent would be expected to have the disease?
12. How is gender determined in humans? What is meant by sex-linked inheritance of the type seen in red-green colorblindness and in hemophilia? What is characteristic of this type of inheritance? Why do males invariably show the alleles inherited from their mother if the trait is inherited in this way?
13. What are the various ways of getting material containing fetal cells or fetal protein to analyze it? What are the ways one can produce an image of a fetus? How are these various tools used? What genetic disease, which causes severe retardation, can be diagnosed shortly after birth, and treated with diet?
14. DNA technology has developed many useful procedures and products using special "tools." How would you use some of these tools to make a recombinant bacterial cell which contained a human gene? Where did these tools come from and what do they do? How would you make a human "gene" that has no introns in it? Why would you have to use such a cDNA gene if you wanted the gene's product to be made correctly in bacteria? What is a radioactive probe and what is it used for? If you have clones (colonies) of bacteria on a plate, and one has the gene of interest in it, how would you locate that particular clone using a radioactive probe and autoradiography?
15. How does one go about making a clone of an animal? How would you use a human clone for therapeutic purposes?  If you wanted to reproduce a human being using cloning, what would you have to do, in addition to producing an embryo in vitro?
16. If you know the sequence of amino acids in a protein (gene product), how would you find the sequence of bases in its DNA gene?
17. What is gel electrophoresis, and how is it used in studying pieces of DNA? What determines how far pieces of DNA travel in a particular time through the gel?
18. How are these DNA techniques combined to analyze the differences in the DNA of human beings?
What has to be done to a DNA sample if there is not enough DNA in it to test? What causes the differences between DNA of different people that we see with RFLP analysis?
19. How many human genes are there in the genome? What other types of DNA are there besides genes? What are telomeres and how do they function during the life of a cell? What happens when the telomeres of the chromosomes of a cell have eroded to a critical point? What is the activity of telomerase? Why is it important to the "immortality" of cancer cells?
20. How is RFLP analysis used to establish paternity? What is the relationship between restriction fragments found in a baby's DNA and those found in the DNA of its parents?
21. When DNA analysis is used to identify an individual and 5 or more probes are used in the identification, what is the probability of a chance match-up of patterns between two people?
Is there a realistic chance of two people having a matching pattern when 5 or more probes are used, except when they are identical twins?
22. How do  results from RFLP analyses of crime scenes support the case of people who oppose the death penalty? Why was O.J. Simpson acquitted, when the DNA evidence in the case put him at the crime scene?
23. Why has it been so important that DNA technology has allowed people to make a large quantity of some human proteins that are usually made in small quantities? What were the drawbacks of getting these human proteins from cadavers, or getting a similar protein from another species, i.e., cattle or pigs? What are some of the human proteins that are produced in bacteria, yeast, and mammalian cells? What is enhancement therapy and how can one use human growth hormone in this way?
24. What is a transgenic animal and how is one produced? How have transgenic sheep been important in production of clotting factor IX?
25. How can anti-sense oligos be used to shut off expression of a particular gene?
26. What is gene therapy? What is used as a vector for genes, to carry them to cells?
What is the demand for such therapy, i.e., how large a fraction of children born in the U.S. have a serious genetic disease? What is SCIDS and how has it been treated using gene therapy? What has impeded the progress in gene therapy in the last few years? What is the problem with using retroviruses (similar to HIV) in gene therapy? How could you treat cancer using gene therapy with the p53 gene?
27. How do "ice-minus" bacteria help prevent frost on crops at temperatures around the freezing point?
28. What portion of soybeans and corn in the U.S. was "genetically modified" in 2000? What traits have been given to GM plants that help the farmer? What kind of nutritional improvements have been made to plants? What is yellow rice and why is it important to people in developing countries? What are complete proteins and why are they important for humans to get in their diets? Why is it important to get complete protein into plants like rice, corn and wheat?
29.What are "knock-out" mice, and what can they be used for?
30. What are the major risks of using DNA technology?

Good luck on your studying! Dr. N-H
 
 

   Problem-based learning is a student-centered teaching technique that has been shown to allow students to assimilate material quickly and retain is much better than instructor-centered teaching by lecturing.
    The students will be divided up into small groups of four to six students. Through discussion and research (in the text and notes) each group will respond to the "problem." Real-world situations, called problems, are given to the group, along with directions for some work that the group will do. For example, the group might be asked to  write answers to questions posed about the problem.
    Group work has been found to be much more efficient than work done by a single person working alone. Each member of a group brings their unique life experience and education to the work of the group, and is a valued participant. Each member will bring some knowledge and areas of ignorance to the group. When the group needs to learn something new to resolve the problem and complete the assignment, that information becomes a "learning issue," which needs to be researched by the members. In this course, the problems will be constructed so that the information needed either comes from lecture notes or the text, or from a synthesis of information from either source.
    On days the professor tells you "group work" will be done, you should bring your class notes and your text to class. You will be placed in permanent groups which will be determined by the teaching staff. For each working session, three roles need to be filled: leader, recorder, and reporter. The leader keeps the discussion orderly and on track, the recorder writes down the ideas expressed and fills in the Group Report form, and the Reporter hands in papers and takes papers from the teaching staff back to the group. These roles will change each time there is group work.
    Problem-based learning and the group activities that will be done this semester will give you experience in communication skills and relationship skills that will benefit you greatly in your education and in your career. This technique is student-centered and each student is responsible to the other members of his/her group for a portion of the work. I hope you will take full advantage of this opportunity to gather and learn new information in a relaxed but efficient way. The new information that is presented in the problems and other group activity will be part of the content of the course, and will be included in examinations. In addition, the Group Report will be graded and used in determining a part of the grade that comes from Activities, Assignments, and Attendance.