In-depth Biology Foundations for Quantitative Scientists

描述(由申请人提供)：罗格斯大学和新泽西医学与牙科大学(UMDNJ)的教职员工建议开发一种新的课程，使在数学和物理科学方面接受高级培训，但在生物学方面背景较有限的学生获得必要的技能，成为生命科学中富有成效的研究人员。该课程将是罗格斯大学和UMDNJ的广泛努力的重要组成部分，目的是在生物学与最近成立的BioMaPS数量生物学研究所所体现的数学和物理科学的界面上进行研究。在罗格斯大学和UMDNJ大学的创新教育战略中，新课程将包括关于理解分子、细胞和结构生物学的基本主题的短期课程，并代表领先的定量生物学家正在做出的重大贡献。每门课程都将提供选定研究领域的基础知识、领先科学家对这些领域当前贡献的高级审查，以及需要定量研究的新发现的生物观察。一个新主题的课程将在五年内每年提供一次。讲座和讲座材料将在网上发布，并将为本科生的一门专题课程准备一本描述性专著。因此，每个研究生和博士后学生将在几年的课程中熟悉当前研究的几个领域，本科生将接触到数量生物学的问题。某些研究主题可能会在随后几年的更新课程中重复。除了分子和细胞生物学定量方面的培训的广度和深度，新课程的优势是：1)每年对一个主题的高度集中将使学生对生物主题有深刻的理解；2)具有更传统生物学背景的学生可以熟悉当前的研究进展。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Faculty members from Rutgers University and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) propose to develop a new curriculum that will enable students with advanced training in mathematics and the physical sciences, but with a more limited background in biology, to acquire the skills necessary to become productive researchers in the life sciences. The curriculum will be a significant part of the extensive effort at Rutgers and UMDNJ to perform research at the interface of biology with the mathematical and physical sciences embodied in the recently-established BioMaPS Institute for Quantitative Biology. In an innovative strategy for education at Rutgers and UMDNJ, the new curriculum will include short courses on topics that are fundamental for understanding molecular, cellular, and structural biology and representative of significant ongoing contributions from leading quantitative biologists. Each course will provide the basics of the selected area of inquiry, advanced reviews of current contributions in these fields by leading scientists, and newly discovered biological observations in need of quantitative investigation. A course on a new topic will be offered every year for five years. The lectures and lecture materials will be posted on the web, and a descriptive monograph will be prepared for a special topics course for undergraduates. Thus, each graduate and post-doctoral student will, over the course of several years, become familiar with several areas of current research, and undergraduates will be exposed to problems in quantitative biology. Certain topics of research may be repeated with updated curricula in subsequent years. In addition to both the breadth and depth of the training in quantitative aspects of molecular and cellular biology, advantages of the new curriculum are: 1) the intense concentration on a theme each year will provide students with a deep understanding of a biological topic and 2) students with a more traditional biological background can become familiar with current research developments.