Midterm Written Assignment
Students will prepare a written critique of a scientific article that relates to the course and is not included in the weekly discussions. The article selected for analysis should be approved by the instructors at least one week in advance of the deadline. The critique should briefly describe the background and context for the work and the central hypothesis of the research, and then critically discuss the key results and controls and the interpretations and conclusions drawn from the experiments. The written assignment should be no more than two pages long, single-spaced, and should focus on the key experiments (and corresponding controls) rather than each and every figure panel. This assignment is due during session 7.
Final Oral Assignment
Oral presentations will take place during our final session. Students will prepare a short journal club presentation (~12 minutes, with 3 minutes for questions/discussion) based on a research article that is different from the written assignment and not included in the weekly discussions. Papers should be approved by the instructors before preparing the presentation and should be different from the paper of the written assignment. The presentation should consist of ~10 slides and include the following: a title slide, 1–2 background slides, a slide that presents the hypothesis/goal of the paper, 3–5 slides that present key experiments and controls, and 1 slide that summarizes the take-home messages and possible future experiments.
