Skip to main content

BIT 295: Biotechnology and Sustainability

Overview

  • Students will evaluate the challenges of sustainable recycling of electronic waste and possible solutions using biotechnology.
  • Students will design and develop approaches that incorporate sustainability and biotechnology to address wicked challenges, such as the accumulation of discarded electronics.

Topics

BIT 295 image: bubbles with images of scientists, DNA, and microbes
In BIT 295, you will work with other student scholars to investigate electronic waste issues and use genomic approaches.
  • Why is the sustainable disposal of electronic waste a global and challenging problem?
  • Principles of Sustainability
  • The Scientific Method
  • Introduction to Biotechnology
  • Reading Critically as a Community of Scholars
  • Experimental Design
  • Demystifying Big Data & High-throughput Approaches
  • Communicating Science with the Public

Lab Sessions:

  • Introduction to genes, genomes, and pangenomes – 3 weeks
  • Studying communities of microbes and their environments – 3 weeks
  • Designing your experiments – 2 weeks
  • Troubleshooting, incorporating feedback, and reevaluating – 3 weeks
  • Analyzing your data – 3 weeks
  • Presenting your case – 1 week 

Back to Courses