Teaching Neuroscience in the Laboratory

神经生物学是一门新兴的跨学科研究，受到大众媒体的广泛关注。国外有一种真正的好奇心，想要了解一个人的大脑和行为之间的动态联系，这不仅应该是科学家教育的一部分，而且应该是普通公众教育的一部分。然而，神经生物学的教学，尤其是在实验室环境中，已经严重落后于需求。在某种程度上，这是因为缺乏“教师友好”的教学练习，以及容易获得道德和环境可接受的实验动物。该项目通过为大学和高中的生理学、神经科学和入门生物学教师提供神经科学实验练习的新课程来解决这些问题。我们教教师如何在他们自己的实验室中使用这些练习，方法是：(1)在康奈尔大学的教学实验室举办一系列夏季研讨会；（二）制作以教师为对象的教学练习教学录像带；(3)建立电子公告板服务，使我们能够与任何正在使用或想要在自己的实验室教学中使用我们的教学模块的老师保持密切联系。我们的教学实验室是基于一套完整的课堂测试实验室，以小龙虾为实验动物。小龙虾是理想的选择，因为它非常耐寒，容易解剖。在实验室后勤方面，它便宜，商业化，易于维护。在教学上，小龙虾是理想的，因为它允许教师从处理神经组织基本细胞特性的简单实验室练习到处理神经网络综合特性、突触计算以及学习和记忆的智力刺激和挑战性练习进行选择。因此，这些教学模块涵盖了基本的神经元特性，如生物电势的离子基础，突触输入，学习和突触可塑性的基本形式。它们利用了神经功能统一的事实，即导致行为改变的神经元计算是相似的，无论是发生在小龙虾还是大学新生的大脑中。因此，小龙虾是脊椎动物制剂的合适替代品，而脊椎动物制剂作为实验对象正变得有争议。该项目不仅为教师提供了一套概念丰富但技术简单的实验练习，而且通过“看而做”的方法为相对缺乏经验的教师提供了直接指导。该提案包括两个部分。首先是为康奈尔大学的实验室教师举办的实践研讨会。第二，也是非常重要的一点，一盘指导录像带正在制作中，供教师一步一步地展示如何做好每一项准备工作。这些练习的预期目标包括文理学院和大学教师，但我们的经验告诉我们，高中教师完全有能力在课堂上学习和使用这些实验，而研讨会也为他们提供了机会。总而言之，该提案旨在传播一套经过彻底测试的实验室教学练习，该练习已被证明在许多环境下对本科生具有刺激作用，并适用于任何希望将神经科学内容带入其实验室的教师。

Neurobiology is an emerging interdisciplinary study that attracts world-wide attention in popular media. There is genuine curiosity abroad to understand the dynamic linkage between one's brain and one's behavior that should be part of the education, of not only scientists, but the lay public. Yet the teaching of neurobiology, especially in a laboratory setting, has badly lagged the demand. In part, this is because of the lack of availability of "teacher friendly" instructional exercises as well as easy availability of ethically and environmentally acceptable experimental animals. This project addresses these problems by providing teachers of physiology, neuroscience, and introductory biology, at the college and the high school level, with a new curriculum of laboratory exercises in neuroscience. We are teaching teachers how to use these exercises in their own labs by: (1) conducting a series of summer workshops in our teaching laboratory at Cornell; (2) producing an instructional videotape of our teaching exercises, aimed at teachers; and (3) setting-up an electronic bulletin-board service that permits us to stay in close contact with any teacher who is using or wants to use our teaching modules in his/her own laboratory instruction. Our teaching labs are based on an integrated set of classroom-tested labs that use the crayfish as the experimental animal. The crayfish is ideal because it is very hardy and easy to dissect. In terms of laboratory logistics, it is cheap, commercial, and easy to maintain. Pedagogically, the crayfish is ideal because it permits the instructor to select from simple lab exercises dealing with fundamental cellular properties of neural tissue to intellectually stimulating and challenging exercises that deal with the integrative properties of neural networks, synaptic computations, and learning and memory. These teaching modules thus cover basic neuronal properties, such as the ionic basis of bioelectric potentials to synaptic transfusion to elementary forms of learning and synaptic plasticity. They take advantage of the fact of the unity of neural function, the neuronal computations that lead to behavioral change are similar, whether occurring in the brain of a crayfish or a college freshman. The crayfish is therefore a suitable replacement for vertebrate preparations, which are becoming controversial as laboratory subjects. This project not only provides teachers with a set of conceptually-rich yet technically simple lab exercises, but it provides direct instruction to relatively inexperienced teachers via a "see and do" methodology. The proposal has two parts. First, a hands-on workshop for laboratory instructors at Cornell. Second, and very importantly, an instructional videotape for instructors showing step-by-step how to make each preparation is being produced. The intended target of these exercises include liberal arts college and university teachers, but our experience tells us that high-school teachers are perfectly capable of learning and employing these labs in their classes, and the workshop provides opportunities for them, as well. In summary, this proposal seeks to disseminate a thoroughly tested set of laboratory teaching exercises, proven to be stimulating to undergraduate students in many settings, to any teacher who wants to bring neuroscience content into his/her laboratory.