Our team is adapting an innovative approach towards implementing an undergraduate laboratory, by simultaneously developing and applying engineering tools towards manipulating, controlling, and utilizing molecules and cells. Design themes are being integrated throughout the laboratories to facilitate students to connect life sciences concepts with engineering principles. We are developing a web-based component for this course in order to enable the students from varying levels of preparedness to achieve the level of integration necessary to be successful in this fundamental course. We are constructing a website with three web modules: i) a virtual laboratory bench; ii) quantitative and statistical analysis; and iii) biomolecular structure, function, and applications. Once the website is complete we will make it accessible to every university and program, including those with limited resources for wet-laboratories, and dramatically extend the impact of this Purdue activity to benefit the broader scientific and educational community.
