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

• 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 

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