Metabolic Control Analysis (MCA) is a systems biology approach that measures the control of a metabolic step on the overall flux of a metabolic pathway. In undergraduate courses in biochemistry, learning of MCA can be encouraged by experimental activities demonstrating practical applications of the MCA theory. In this work, we present a laboratory…

Exposure to real-life applications of quantitative analysis techniques based on two gas chromatography (GC) experiments was provided to a large cohort of sophomore-level students. In one experiment, students assessed blood alcohol content by internal standardization using a homemade headspace system similar to methods implemented in forensic…

Optimization of experimental conditions in chromatography is recognized as a wear-and-tear process involving hundreds of experiments in order to maximize the number of separated compounds for each sample. The critical thinking skills and practices entailed cannot be achieved with students in a conventional lecture class. This report provides a…

The goal of this laboratory exercise is to give upper-level undergraduate students an introduction to sterile technique in mammalian cell culture and metabolism. The experiment can be completed within a 3-h lab period and can be performed either in conjunction with other biochemistry/metabolism experiments or used as a stand-alone experiment. In…

Laboratory exercises for undergraduate biochemistry students are described in which changes in sugar content during fermentation of the trendy beverage kombucha are analyzed by three methods: thin layer chromatography, a 3,5-dinitrosalicylic acid assay, and a standard commercial blood glucose meter. Each of the three analyses can be completed in a…

Laboratory course activities often focus on "cookbook style," so their activities have not yet integrated with scientific thinking as an essential aspect. In this research, the laboratory experience of microbial analysis techniques was redesigned using alternative inquiry to involve students in isolating and characterising yeast to make…

This paper describes an undergraduate biochemistry laboratory module consisting of a set of experiments designed around a purification scheme for bovine serum albumin (BSA). Students purify BSA from cow plasma by a combination of salt and acetone precipitation, equilibrium dialysis, ion exchange, and size exclusion chromatography. Students use the…

In this work, we present the results of an undergrad student from the perspective of its first approach as a principal researcher in a project. In order to gain practical experience, one of the options for students that have interest in pursuing a postgraduate program corresponds to a research stay in a laboratory of their selected field…

The design of undergraduate laboratory courses that provide meaningful research-based experiences enhances undergraduate curricula and prepares future graduate students for research careers. In this article, a course-based undergraduate research experience (CURE) laboratory module was designed for upper-division undergraduate biochemistry and…

This article describes a laboratory exercise designed for undergraduate students in the subject of "Regulation of cell proliferation" which allows the students to carry out a research experiment in an important field such as cell cycle control, and to be introduced to a widely used technique in molecular biology laboratories such as the…

Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) is the basis for many techniques used in biomedical research. Due to its wide use in molecular sensing, FRET is commonly introduced in many biology, chemistry, and physics courses. While FRET is of great importance in the biophysical sciences, the complexity and difficulty of constructing FRET experiments…

The development and implementation of research-inspired, discovery-based experiences into science laboratory curricula is a proven strategy for increasing student engagement and ownership of experiments. In the novel laboratory module described herein, students learn to express, purify, and characterize a carbohydrate-active enzyme using modern…

Volatile compounds from polymeric materials such as weatherstripping were identified by solid-phase microextraction (SPME), a solvent-free analytical method, coupled to gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). These compounds, originating from additives and fillers used in weatherstripping processing, were mostly polycyclic aromatic…

An undergraduate biochemistry laboratory experiment is described that utilizes free online bioinformatics tools along with readily available exonucleases to study the effects of base stacking and hydrogen bonding on the UV absorbance of DNA samples. UV absorbance of double-stranded DNA at the ?[subscript max] is decreased when the DNA bases are…

The laboratory practice "Primary culture and directional differentiation of rat bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs)" is part of a required course for sophomore medical students at Tongji university, which has been conducted since 2012. Blended learning has been widely applied in medical courses. Based on a student-centered…