This small, liberal arts institution serves approximately 5,000 undergraduate students. Each year approximately 300 students conduct physiology laboratory experiments in one of five separate biology courses. Six to seven percent of these students come from traditionally underrepresented groups in the sciences. In these courses, students learn physiological concepts and techniques through an inquiries-based approach and through cooperative and collaborative learning. While the laboratory methods for collecting and recording data pertaining to physiological events have progressed rapidly, the equipment available to students has not kept pace. A series of experiments based upon those already being performed is being developed to give students the opportunity to collect and analyze data with state-of-the-art transducers and instrumentation and a computerized acquisition system. Additionally, computer simulations of other physiological events are used, allowing for practical lab experience, realistic experimental design, and data analysis in a short period of time and at a low cost. The inclusion of additional laboratory exercises designed to investigate human physiology makes the lab experience more relative to a wider variety of students and helps recruit more underrepresented students into biology. Finally, all new laboratory exercises and student-collected data can be made available through the World Wide Web. Posting the data enables students conducting the same experiments throughout the world to share their data, refine the laboratory exercises, and establish networks that can serve them throughout their careers.
