URL study guide

https://studiegids.vu.nl/en/courses/2024-2025/AB_1047

Course Objective

The student has insight into and understanding of biological processes that are fundamental in living cells. The student has an overview of techniques used in Cell Biology and understands their working principle. The student can work with scientific literature and is able to summarize and analyze information from various literature sources.

Course Content

We start with a brief repetition of basic Cell Biology and then go ahead with in-depth discussion of modern Cell Biology, current and emerging topics, and experimental techniques. Planned topics include: General cell organization and function, cell biology of selected cell types or cell parts: e.g.: energy metabolism, endothelial cells, cellular stress response, protein sorting and membrane transport, host-pathogen interactions, human microbiome. Techniques/approaches in Cell Biology: basic techniques in Cell Biology, (confocal) microscopy and live cell Imaging, protein labeling and visualization techniques, knock-out and RNAi techniques, single cell analysis. Students will also work on a literature assignment (in groups).

Teaching Methods

Lectures (24 h), work discussions related to the literature assignment (8 h), self-study (136 h).

Method of Assessment

Written exam (2/3), literature assignment (1/3). The final grade needs to be 5.5 or higher to pass the course.

Literature

No book is mandatory. If you wish to learn using a book: "Molecular Biology of the Cell" by Alberts et al, which is very broad and informative, may be a good investment. For students who may lack background "Essential Cell Biology" (also by Alberts et al), which is more concise, can be useful to quickly take care of this deficiency. We will also work with scientific literature. Examples: Bald et al. MBio 2017, Frottin et al. Science 2019.

Target Audience

Students enrolled in the Minor Biomolecular Sciences.

Additional Information

This course is offered in period 1 and is based on first and second year level courses in Cell Biology.

Recommended background knowledge

Basic (first and second year level) courses in Cell Biology.
Academic year1/09/2431/08/25
Course level6.00 EC

Language of Tuition

  • English

Study type

  • Bachelor