Biology: Comparative Physiology

Physiology at the organ, systems, and organismal levels. Capstone course to consolidate biological concepts. Prerequisites: BCOR 2300; BCOR 2100 or BCOR 2500.

Prereq enforced by systm: BCOR 2300; BCOR 2100 or BCOR 2500; Must register for a BIOL 4405 lab A01-A06 PACE students by permission and override

Course Objectives: To examine the basic principles of how organisms work, focusing on evolutionary influences on physiological function, and how physiology constrains or facilitates adaptation to the environment. To develop the skills needed to interpret and critically evaluate papers from the 
primary scientific literature. To refine data analysis and scientific writing. Learning Outcomes: Upon completion of this course, you should be able to: understand basic physiological principles apply physiological principles to interpret scientific data conceptualize an holistic perspective on biology that integrates across multiple fields (i.e., biochemistry, molecular and cellular biology, genetics, evolutionary biology, and ecology)

Lectures meet twice per week. You are expected to complete readings before class, and to participate in class discussions. Assigned readings are meant to supplement the lectures and provide a greater depth of the course material. You are expected to attend lectures if you are physically well. If you are not physically well, go to Student Health Services. If you have an upper respiratory infection, please wear a mask as a courtesy to everyone else in class. Exams will consist of multiple choice questions. I write the exams fresh every year based on what we cover in lectures. Previous years’ exams are available on Brightspace, but do not reflect what will be on this year’s exams. Use previous exams as practice. Do not use them as a substitute for studying the material. Do not expect to do well on exams if you do not attend lectures. Exam questions can be tricky, with answers not easily found on Google. Exam questions require you to think. Don’t use ChatGPT or other AI tools; AI gets my questions wrong 50% of the time. Cheating will not be tolerated and will result in an F in the course (see below). Please review UVM’s policy for academic integrity (www.uvm.edu/~uvmppg/ppg/student/acadintegrity.pdf). Laboratory Sections: Lab meets once weekly for three hours. You are expected to complete readings before lab, and to participate in lab. Attendance is mandatory if you are physically well. If you are not physically well, go Student Health Services. If you have an upper respiratory infection, please wear a mask as a courtesy to everyone else in lab. The focus of the labs will be to discover and manipulate physiological responses to environmental stimuli. Thus, the lab exercises will give you experience with the scientific method and a chance to witness various physiological phenomena. You will be working with live organisms; therefore, be prepared to get good at troubleshooting your experiments because sometimes the organisms and experimental techniques do not behave as planned. Structure of the Laboratories: Lab sections will start with a short introduction by the instructor followed by your active experimentation. You are expected to be self-directed during lab. The instructors will not do the experiments for you, but rather offer help along the way. Therefore, you must read the lab materials before coming to the lab section. Lab exercises will be available on Brightspace. Software Download: You must download and install GraphPad Prism and Microsoft Word onto your laptop. You will be using these two applications in your lab section, so please also bring your laptop to the lab section. In order to download and install Prism and Word, go to the UVM software portal by clicking the icon on the right hand side of the following webpage: https://www.uvm.edu/it/it-software. Once you click the icon, you will log in with your netId and password and follow the directions for installing AppsAnywhere and then Prism and Word onto your computer. If you don't have a laptop, please just let your TA know; you will have access to computers in the lab classroom, which already have GraphPad Prism and Word installed. Introduction to Data Analysis: You are responsible for completing the introduction to statistics and data analysis exercise on the first day of lab. This exercise will teach you skills that you will use to write your results sections, lab report, and independent project final paper (see below). Writing Example Review: You are responsible for completing a review of an example of scientific writing. This exercise will introduce you to basic concepts in scientific writing, including how TO write and how NOT to write a scientific paper. Lab Report Sections: You are responsible for writing 4 lab report sections (i.e., Methods, Results, Introduction, and Discussion). You will write one Methods, one Results, and one Introduction section, one for each of the three prescribed labs. The purpose of the report sections is to give you practice with scientific writing. This will help you write your independent project final paper (see below). For the Discussion section, you may choose which lab for which you would like to write the Discussion section. NOTE: The work you put into the 4 report sections will help you successfully write your Independent Project Final Paper (worth 20% of your grade). Independent Project, Final Paper, and Oral Presentation: You will design and execute an independent research project in groups of 3. Please find two people to be your partners as soon as possible. This is a chance for you to take what you learn in lecture and lab and use it to pursue your own research interests. You are encouraged to be creative, but your experiments must be feasible and within the scope of the topics covered in the course. Your experiments must be conducted on invertebrates only. You are encouraged to collect your own invertebrates from nature. If you would like to rely on study organisms that we provide, you will have a choice of crayfish, mussels, crickets, and/or Drosophila. I. Project Proposal: You must receive approval for your independent project by submitting a project proposal to your lab instructor by October 11th. In your proposal: Write a paragraph that describes (1) your research question, (2) why your question is important, (3) the hypothesis(es) your are testing, (4) the organisms you will be studying, and (5) your experimental plan. List the equipment you will be using, the materials you will need, and the species and number of animals on which you will experiment. Include a detailed, step-by-step, experimental procedure. In other words, what are you going to do in the lab, and how are you going to do it? List references to at least 10 scientific papers in your topic area that you used to develop your proposal. Please Note: You may only conduct experiments on invertebrates (see above). Also note that you are restricted to the use of the laboratory equipment available in Discovery 209. II. Final Paper: You are responsible for writing a final paper on your independent project. It is very important that you listen to the feedback of your teaching assistant on your writing of the 4 lab report sections. This will help you write a good scientific paper for your independent project final paper, which is worth 20% of your grade in the course overall. You will be given more detailed instructions on the final paper in your laboratory sections. But, in general, your final paper should include: Title Abstract (Summary) Introduction Materials and Methods Results, including figures, tables and relevant statistics Discussion Bibliography III. Oral Presentation: On the last day of lab, you will present your project and findings — together with your partners — in a short 5-minute oral presentation (via Keynote, Powerpoint, etc.). Divide the tasks evenly amongst your group to prepare and deliver the presentation. Oral presentations will take place during the week of Dec. 6 - 8. Each presentation should include the following: Background Materials and Methods Results, including a visual presentation of your data (i.e. figures, tables etc.) Conclusions and Broader Implications.

Grades: 3 midterms and one final exam worth a total of 40%. 8 lab writing assignments and oral presentation worth a total of 60%.