生物信息学及其研究现状

生物信息学是采用计算机技术和信息论方法研究生命科学中各种生物信息的表达、采集、储存、传递、检索、分析和解读的科学,是现代生命科学与信息科学、计算机科学、数学、统计学、物理学、化学等学科相互渗透而高度交叉形成的一门新兴前沿学科.对生物信息学的起源、研究内容、研究热点及应用等进行了综述,并展望了其今后的发展前景.     

生物信息学课程“开放式、研究性”教学模式的探讨

生物信息学是20世纪分子生物学和计算机科学交叉结合产生的新学科,是目前生命科学最具活力的前沿领域之一。根据生物信息学的学科特点及对国外医学生物信息学教育特点的分析,结合现代教育技术,就构建一种复合的开放式（问题探究型、小组协作探究型）、研究性（“招标式小组”、“因才施教”的专题研究型）生物信息学课程教学模式进行探讨,为我国生物信息学课程改革和与国际接轨提供指导。     

生物数据库建立与应用的研究

生物信息学是一门在生命科学的研究中计算机科学与生物学及应用数学等多学科相互交叉而形成的综合性学科。主要介绍了生物信息学数据库的分类和生物信息学数据库的特点及其应用,同时对生物信息学数据库的未来发展作了进一步的展望。     

生物信息学在微生物中的应用

生物信息学是建立在生命科学和计算机数学基础上的综合学科，其本质是信息技术在生物学中的应用。对于微生物领域而言，生物信息学对数据的整理和应用可以极大地提升微生物研究的质量。因此，文章采用文献研究的方法，积极搜集生物信息学在微生物中的应用研究，首先概述了生物信息学的组成部分，然后对微生物学的建立与发展进行了详细说明，最后探讨了生物信息学在微生物生态学、环境微生物、农业微生物、微生物药物合成设计以及微生物致病基因5个方面的应用。     

关于高通量测序背景下生物信息学教学的一些建议

高通量数据背景下,生物信息学已成为解决生物问题一门必备知识和工具,本文从生命科学的现实背景出发,探讨了高通量测序时代关于生物信息学课程的教学内容、教学方式和教学目的方面的一些建议。期望通过现代生物信息学课程的设计和讲授,使学生及时掌握利用生物信息学处理前沿问题的能力,强化生物信息学实践教学中技能的培养,培养在获取、处理、开发和利用等方面有较强的研究能力和实践能力的生物信息技术人才,提高生命科学相关专业学生的社会就业竞争力。     

现代分子生物学研究方法综述

分子生物学是生命科学的重要分支学科,目前以生物大分子为研究对象的分子生物学已经成为现代生物学领域里最具活力的学科．对分子生物学的研究内容、特点及现代分子生物技术的一些进展进行了综述,并展望了现代分子生物学的发展趋势．     

分子生物学的发展

分子生物学(Molecular Biology)是一门现代生物学,一门带动整个生命科学的前沿学科,是生物化学与遗传学、微生物学、细胞学、生物物理学等学科相结合的基础上发展起来的崭新学科。“分子生物学”一词最早于1945年William Astbury首先在Harvey Lecture上应用的,由于它能从分子水平了解各种生命现象的根本原因,一开始就将研究对象主要集中于生物大分子——核酸(DNA和RNA)的研究,并已经成为现代生命科学的“共同语言”。     

国内外生物信息学数据库服务新进展

生物信息学是生命科学中最活跃的领域之一. 各类生物信息学数据库在近年不断出现,其规模呈爆炸趋势增长,同时数据结构日趋复杂. 目前生物信息学数据库服务已实现了高度的计算机和网络化. 算法和软件的进步、数据库的一体化、服务器-客户模式的建立使之成为生物、医药、农业等学科的强有力工具. 在国内北京大学物理化学研究所于1996年建立了第一家生物信息学网络服务器. 现已为国内外科学家提供了7万余次服务,在国际上具有一定影响.     

生物奥赛实验能力如何加强？

生命科学是一门以实验为基础的自然学科,生物学实验无论是在生命科学的发展．还是在现代生命科学的研究中,对基础理论的建立,对科学方法和思想方祛的获得．以及在生物教育中对学生各方面能力的培养．部有十分重要的意义。因此,代表中学学科最高水平的国际生物奥林匹克竞赛(简称IBO)对参赛者的生物学实验能力提出了很高的要求。     

网络上的生物信息资源

生物信息学是生命科学中最活跃的领域之一。目前,生物信息资源的利用已实现了高度的网络化。算法和软件的进步、数据库的一体化、服务器－客户模式的建立使之成为生物、医药、农业等学科强有力的工具。     

数字透出的信息——生命科学正在蓬勃发展

生命科学和信息科学是近年来发展很快因而备受科学界关注的学科。我们以国际、国内的有关科学论坛、科学会议、科学评论及有关网站的统计数据为基础 ,对生命科学和信息科学进行了初步的比较研究 ,并对生命科学和信息科学的发展趋势进行了简略的探讨。     

Local advisers for the teaching of microbiology in schools

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of formal teaching of ethical issues related to science on middle school students' attitudes towards science and science achievement. A total of 132 Grade 8 (age 13 – 14years) students in Seoul participated, who were divided into the control and the experimental group. Student attitude toward science was assessed using a questionnaire before and after the intervention which composed of five sub-categories: students' interest level in science, students' perception of the practicality of science knowledge, student's opinion on how science is defined, students' perception of the relationships within science, scientists and society, and students' perception of the value of science. The study further examined whether teaching ethical issues in science had any effect on students' achievement level by means of a pre- and post-test evaluation.

The results of this study showed that teaching ethical issues in science had a positive influence on the students' attitudes toward science, specifically, the interest level in science (p = 0.028) and perception of practicality of science knowledge (p = 0.044). However, there was no statistically significant difference in science achievement level between the control and experimental groups. The results imply that there is a need to explore ethical issues in science education, and that incorporating various materials on the ethical perspectives of science and technology in educational material will promote students' positive attitude towards science.     

Fostering Change from Within: Influencing Teaching Practices of Departmental Colleagues by Science Faculty with Education Specialties

Globally, calls for the improvement of science education are frequent and fervent. In parallel, the phenomenon of having Science Faculty with Education Specialties (SFES) within science departments appears to have grown in recent decades. In the context of an interview study of a randomized, stratified sample of SFES from across the United States, we discovered that most SFES interviewed (82%) perceived having professional impacts in the realm of improving undergraduate science education, more so than in research in science education or K-12 science education. While SFES reported a rich variety of efforts towards improving undergraduate science education, the most prevalent reported impact by far was influencing the teaching practices of their departmental colleagues. Since college and university science faculty continue to be hired with little to no training in effective science teaching, the seeding of science departments with science education specialists holds promise for fostering change in science education from within biology, chemistry, geoscience, and physics departments.     

An exploratory study of student teachers’ conceptions of teaching life science outdoors

Abstract

The purpose of this exploratory qualitative study was to investigate elementary student teachers’ conceptions of teaching life science outdoors. The study involved 99 student teachers who were enrolled in an elementary science methods course at a large public university in the United States of America. The study utilised drawings, and narratives to investigate the nature of these teachers’ conceptions. Data analysis revealed that three conceptions of teaching life science were common among the participants: (1) teaching life science is predominantly conceptualised as being situated in the schoolyard, (2) teaching life science outdoors is teacher-directed, and (3) teaching life science outdoors is disconnected from in-class science instruction. Implications include the need for (1) teacher education programmes to provide reflective supports that explicate student teachers’ conceptualisation of teaching life science and thus exposing prior frameworks; and (2) teacher educators to examine student teachers’ prior frameworks for teaching life science outdoors and provide knowledgeable theory and practice platforms that will serve as frameworks for student teachers to adopt, connect and routinize outdoor life science teaching with in-school teaching of life science.     

Investigating Human Impact in the Environment with Faded Scaffolded Inquiry Supported by Technologies

Teaching science as inquiry is advocated in all national science education documents and by leading science and science teaching organizations. In addition to teaching science as inquiry, we recognize that learning experiences need to connect to students’ lives. This article details how we use a sequence of faded scaffolded inquiry supported by technologies to engage students meaningfully in science connected to their lives and schoolyards. In this approach, more teacher guidance is provided earlier in the inquiry experiences before this is faded later in the sequence, as students are better prepared to complete successful inquiries. The sequence of inquiry experiences shared in this article offers one possible mechanism for science teaching supported by technologies as an exemplar for translating teaching “science as inquiry” into practice.     

Tailoring science outreach through E-matching using a community-based participatory approach

In an effort to increase science exposure for pre-college (K-12) students and as part of the science education reform agenda, many biomedical research institutions have established university-community partnerships. Typically, these science outreach programs consist of pre-structured, generic exposure for students, with little community engagement. However, the use of a medium that is accessible to both teachers and scientists, electronic web-based matchmaking (E-matching) provides an opportunity for tailored outreach utilizing a community-based participatory approach (CBPA), which involves all stakeholders in the planning and implementation of the science outreach based on the interests of teachers/students and scientists. E-matching is a timely and urgent endeavor that provides a rapid connection for science engagement between teachers/students and experts in an effort to fill the science outreach gap. National Lab Network (formerly National Lab Day), an ongoing initiative to increase science equity and literacy, provides a model for engaging the public in science via an E-matching and hands-on learning approach. We argue that science outreach should be a dynamic endeavor that changes according to the needs of a target school. We will describe a case study of a tailored science outreach activity in which a public school that serves mostly under-represented minority students from disadvantaged backgrounds were E-matched with a university, and subsequently became equal partners in the development of the science outreach plan. In addition, we will show how global science outreach endeavors may utilize a CBPA, like E-matching, to support a pipeline to science among under-represented minority students and students from disadvantaged backgrounds. By merging the CBPA concept with a practical case example, we hope to inform science outreach practices via the lens of a tailored E-matching approach.     

Definition of the real domain of the history of sciences and exploring the relationship with the philosophy of science

The specific field of the history of science is the study and explanation of the origin and transformation of the structures of scientific knowledge. The historian of science should render understandable the reality of scientific research. The relationships between the history of science and the philosophy of science are examined stating that (1) the philosophical theories on the development of science have a scientific content only as much as they may be compared with the results of the history of science, and (2) the philosophy of science does not refer to an immediate historical reality but to an intellectual reconstruction of the past.     

Plans of mice and men: from bench science to science policy

The transition from bench science to science policy is not always a smooth one, and my journey stretched as far as the unemployment line to the hallowed halls of the U.S. Capitol. While earning my doctorate in microbiology, I found myself more interested in my political activities than my experiments. Thus, my science policy career aspirations were born from merging my love of science with my interest in policy and politics. After receiving my doctorate, I accepted the Henry Luce Scholarship, which allowed me to live in South Korea for 1 year and delve into the field of science policy research. This introduction into science policy occurred at the South Korean think tank called the Science and Technology Policy Institute (STEPI). During that year, I used textbooks, colleagues, and hands-on research projects as my educational introduction into the social science of science and technology decision-making. However, upon returning to the United States during one of the worst job markets in nearly 80 years, securing a position in science policy proved to be very difficult, and I was unemployed for five months. Ultimately, it took more than a year from the end of the Luce Scholarship to obtain my next science policy position with the American Society for Microbiology Congressional Fellowship. This fellowship gave me the opportunity to work as the science and public health advisor to U.S. Senator Harry Reid. While there were significant challenges during my transition from the laboratory to science policy, those challenges made me tougher, more appreciative, and more prepared to move from working at the bench to working in the field of science policy.     

``Why Study History for Science?'

David Hull has demonstrated a marvelous ability to annoy everyone who caresabout science (or should), by forcing us to confront deep truths about howscience works. Credit, priority, precularities, and process weave together tomake the very fabric of science. As Hull's studies reveal, the story is bothmessier and more irritating than those limited by a single disciplinaryperspective generally admit. By itself history is interesting enough, andphilosophy valuable enough. But taken together, they do so much in tellingus about science and by puncturing the comfortable popular illusion abouthow science works. Ultimately, David Hull shows by his example thathistory and philosophy of science can make science better. I agree, and withits focus on the history of science in particular, this paper explores why.     

Scientists want more children

Scholars partly attribute the low number of women in academic science to the impact of the science career on family life. Yet, the picture of how men and women in science--at different points in the career trajectory--compare in their perceptions of this impact is incomplete. In particular, we know little about the perceptions and experiences of junior and senior scientists at top universities, institutions that have a disproportionate influence on science, science policy, and the next generation of scientists. Here we show that having fewer children than wished as a result of the science career affects the life satisfaction of science faculty and indirectly affects career satisfaction, and that young scientists (graduate students and postdoctoral fellows) who have had fewer children than wished are more likely to plan to exit science entirely. We also show that the impact of science on family life is not just a woman's problem; the effect on life satisfaction of having fewer children than desired is more pronounced for male than female faculty, with life satisfaction strongly related to career satisfaction. And, in contrast to other research, gender differences among graduate students and postdoctoral fellows disappear. Family factors impede talented young scientists of both sexes from persisting to research positions in academic science. In an era when the global competitiveness of US science is at risk, it is concerning that a significant proportion of men and women trained in the select few spots available at top US research universities are considering leaving science and that such desires to leave are related to the impact of the science career on family life. Results from our study may inform university family leave policies for science departments as well as mentoring programs in the sciences.