[Freak705]

From what I remember:

Lab 1 - Ecology
The point of the lab is to assess the health of Cootes Paradise by examination of water pH and phosphate concentrations, as well as by measure of bioindicator species. Basically, you get to go down to Cootes as a class, and dig up some bugs in the wetlands to count them. Different species tolerate different levels of pollution and contaminants, and so by counting the different number of different species you can get a rough estimate of the local health of the ecosystem

Lab 2 - Microbiology & Quorum Sensing
Here you'll inoculate potato slices with two different types of bacteria, and try to isolate bacterial HSL (homoserine lactones) which act as chemical messengers for the bacteria that drive metabolism and behaviour depending on population density of the bacteria. Based on the results from the potato inoculation, you construct a hypothesis and a model experiment to test your hypothesis for week 2.

Lab 3- Animal Physiology
This one was a reaaaally cool lab. You put a frog under, and then dissect it to expose the heart while the frog is still alive. You hook up the heart to a small pin that's connected to a force trasnducer and computer, which measures the frog's heart contractions (essentially it creats an ECG on-screen). The point of the lab is to investigate different hormones and chemicals that effect the heart rate and stroke volume of the heart. Very mega super awesome cool.

Lab 4- Cell Biology
This one was a little tedious, but still pretty interesting. You use the model system of chromatophore dispersion on fish scales to characterize movement of chemicals within a cell. Essentially, different chemicals/messengers can effect the distribution and transport of materials in a cell along the cytoskeleton. Your job is to create a serial dilution and measure the effects of various chemicals on the dispersion of chromatophores. The tedious part is counting, and rating individually the chromatophores (~30 per scale, photographed every 30 seconds for 5 minutes, on about 5 or 6 different trials).

Lab 5- Plant-Pathogen Interactions
This was another really cool lab. The point of this lab was to inoculate several strais of the model organism Arabadopsis thaliana with 2 strains of bacteria, directly into the leaves. You then characterize the infection after certain time periods by photograph, and by serial dilution plating and colony counting by extracting bacteria from the plants after an the inoculation period.

Lab 6- Mutant Screening of C. elegans
This was a pretty simple lab. In week 1 you have two strains of worms, one that was randomly mutagenized chemically, and one strain with a specific mutation that makes it unable to perform proper chemotaxis. Basically, you form a pellet of worms, and put them on petri dishes that have dots of salt or water. Normal worms move to the salt, and worms with mutations in genes involving chemotaxis should move randomly. At the end of the lab you try to isolate 3 worms that you believe to be chemotaxis deficient, and allow them to grow and reproduce for a week. In week 2, you repeat the experiment with the progeny of your worms from week 1 to see if you were successful.

The assignments are very straight-forward. At the beginning they'll be about hypothesis formulation, or designing an experiment. Pretty simple stuff. Later on the assignments focus on publishing papers, or retracting papers, etc. They're not difficult.

Labs are every week, with all the labs having 2 weeks (ie 2 lab periods) slotted for them. For 2 of the labs, you will have to write a formal lab report. These are much more formal than in other biology classes - you have to format them EXACTLY as if they were published as a Letter to Nature. Same font, same font sizes, same style of writing & content, same everything, However, I found this to be a GOOD thing. They don't really have to be overly long, and having that level of detail makes it very easy to do well. There's no second-guessing how you're supposed to format or order the contents of your lab (my #1 pet peeve with practically all other bio labs). Generally if there's a formal lab due, you'll also have no lab for a week to give you time to write it.

For the non-formal labs, generally you will only have to hand in a diagram, or a small write-up that you finish at home. Not hard if you know your way around Excel. Your lab book is also graded at the end of the term, and you get an evuation (not worth marks) halfway through the term. I definitely suggest you be THOROUGH in your note-writing for your labs. Document every and all possible sources of error for your experiments (those minor details escape you when you're writing your labs!). Take lots of pictures and include them in your book as well, and make sure to label those pictures in your bool.

Luckily, the TA's for this class are the best I've ever had! Very friendly, and very helpful.

Class will cover the basic elements of experimental design as well as the process of publishing a paper. In the weeks of a new lab topic, there will almost always be a guest lecturer to introduce the theory behind the labs. These guest lecturers will also be present in your lab periods to help guide the labs.

Dr. Jacobs definitely tries to push you to think critically, and since it's a relatively small class he definitely tries to engage students. He often will give candy to people that participate in class :p To be honest, I slept through most of the classes, but in the end it's alright because you're never really tested on what's going in inside the classes at any detailed level; it's all being applied and used in the labs anyways.

So, I slept through most classes, and sadly I did most of my lab write-ups at 3am the day before they were do, but I still managed a 12. I strongly recommend you work on the labs a little bit here and there throughout the week as opposed to my approach - the lack of sleep and abuse of my schedule definitely cut into time for my other classes :p Overall though, a very reasonable and enjoyable course!

I just got into this course, yay!

Do any of the labs take the full three hours? Also, is there any sort of pre-lab component we have to complete before doing a lab?

hey are there any mids or exams and how are they?

Originally Posted by Chevalier

hey are there any mids or exams and how are they?

I don't see a midterm, but the outline includes a final: http://www.biology.mcmaster. ca/cou...02009 -10.pdf

Originally Posted by oranges

I just got into this course, yay!

Do any of the labs take the full three hours? Also, is there any sort of pre-lab component we have to complete before doing a lab?

omg lucky i want this course so bad but it's always fullll!!!!!!!

Originally Posted by cjdzl

omg lucky i want this course so bad but it's always fullll!!!!!!!

It's actually open right now. Go check SOLAR, quick!

Originally Posted by oranges

I just got into this course, yay!

Do any of the labs take the full three hours? Also, is there any sort of pre-lab component we have to complete before doing a lab?

Most of the labs take around the full lab time. Especially the chromatophore lab, almost every group went over for time in the first week of that lab. However, unlike chem labs/physics labs/other bio labs, the labs are very low pressure... My TA was always willing to stay a little later, and generally the work involved in the lab is not very stressful.

Pre-labs: There is an online quiz before week1 of every lab that goes pretty deep into the theory behind the labs (not really the procedure). Turn to these questions when you're writing your discussions/introductions for material to write about. Dr. Jacobs posts scanned textbook materials/other supplementary materials online for you to read in order to answer the questions.

This class is, in my opinion, first and foremost a lab class. This is not like other labs where you can walk in having skimmed the procedure 10 minutes before. Know your stuff going in, and you will be alright. It's really not scary though. The class component of this course is really light, so you can focus on the labs much more.

Originally Posted by Chevalier

hey are there any mids or exams and how are they?

There are no midterms, and there is 1 take-home exam worth ~20% of your mark. You have the exam posted a couple weeks before the end of the term, and you are free to work with others on it. If you *take your time* on it, it is very easy. It is not something that can be rushed. Work with others, talk through things, and examine the questions THOROUGHLY. If you have a logical mind, you will do well! To be honest, I skipped ~40% of the classes and I still got a 90%+ on the final.

sounds interesting...maybe ill consider it

Awesome course. TA's always mark super easy. Labs usually finish well before they are scheduled to end. Only two lectures per week with little to no content! You WILL NOT regret taking this course!

Originally Posted by kiol

Awesome course. TA's always mark super easy. Labs usually finish well before they are scheduled to end. Only two lectures per week with little to no content! You WILL NOT regret taking this course!

hey are you taking this course right now this year? i was thinking about taking it this year but couldnt, so i might be taking it next year, could you tell me a bit more, has it changed much from the overall discription above...

also is ti easy to get lets say a 12 in this?
also how much time you spend on lab reports and assignments and are they marked relatively easily/hard?

12 shouldn't be that hard with modest effort. But are you f*cking kidding me, your profile says your in drama, so unless you have a bio background somehow then i dunno why you'd bother, although even if you don't have a bio background at all you might still be able to pull off a 12 with a little bit more effort.

You shouldn't go into this blindly. To be honest this is the most time consuming course I have taken so far in university. Often expectations aren't clear and many of the assignments take additional background research/knowledge to complete. Also, the assignments can be really picky and a lot of people had low marks initially. Fortunately, since it is a small class, you really get to know your peers and I have made some really great friends because of this. Dr. Jacob's can be intimidating to some but I really enjoyed him. Also it should be noted that labs this semester always ran over towards the end of term; we were often there until at least 6 pm, and sometimes later. Plus it's often required to go to the lab throughout the week, outside your scheduled lab time to document results etc.

While, I don't encourage you to take this class for an easy 12, I do think you should take it if you want to gain valuable lab experience and push yourself to think critically. I don't regret taking this class and gained a lot of hands on experience, which I am grateful for.

Exactly how small were the classes?

Hi there,
I took Bio 2L03 last semester and there were approx 35 students in my lecture.

Hope this helps!

Originally Posted by bsteele

You shouldn't go into this blindly. To be honest this is the most time consuming course I have taken so far in university. Often expectations aren't clear and many of the assignments take additional background research/knowledge to complete. Also, the assignments can be really picky and a lot of people had low marks initially. Fortunately, since it is a small class, you really get to know your peers and I have made some really great friends because of this. Dr. Jacob's can be intimidating to some but I really enjoyed him. Also it should be noted that labs this semester always ran over towards the end of term; we were often there until at least 6 pm, and sometimes later. Plus it's often required to go to the lab throughout the week, outside your scheduled lab time to document results etc.

While, I don't encourage you to take this class for an easy 12, I do think you should take it if you want to gain valuable lab experience and push yourself to think critically. I don't regret taking this class and gained a lot of hands on experience, which I am grateful for.

Well said! I couldn't agree more.