This newly designed course in molecular biology features the use of chemiluminescent and chromogenic techniques, thus eliminating the need for radioisotopes in probing and sequencing.Also featured is the use of plants for projects involving eukaryotes, avoiding the problems associated with animals but allowing exploration of recombinant DNA and molecular evolution in complex, differentiated organisms. The courses include a basic molecular biology course, an advanced course in recombinant DNA and molecular evolution, and undergraduate research projects in molecular and population genetics. Some of these projects act as pilot runs for developing labs for the advanced molecular biology course. Some of the exercises included are DNA amplification via polymerase chain reaction (PCR), transformation of plant tissue with Agrobacterium, isolation of plant organelles and their DNA and enzymes, DNA sequencing, and developmental expression of genes.
