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A New Frontier: Systems Biology Video
This 13-minute video from the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Center for Life Science Education, in conjunction with the School of Medicine, explains systems biology—the way complex systems and patterns emerge out of many relatively simple interactions to order to model and discover life. In the video, VCU Professors Tom Huff and Greg Buck shed light on the benefits and challenges of the systems biology approach, contending that the new generation of scientists will need to look at biology as an informational science and to use quantitative and computational approaches. The film also highlights the work of Jeff Elhai of VCU’s Center for the Study of Biological Complexity; he has helped to develop BioBIKE, a programming language that incorporates concepts familiar to molecular biologists and is accessible through the Web to scientists without programming experience. Using BioBIKE, students at Chesterfield Technical Center in Chesterfield, Virginia, teamed up with Elhai and VCU students to conduct original research into virus samples. The video is part of a larger public education campaign called “Secrets of the Sequence,” a series of more than 50 downloadable videos and accompanying lessons for science educators worldwide. The videos help teachers apply genetic research across the biology curriculum and create an avenue for students to learn from leading scientists and ethicists about the moral, ethical, and legal impacts of recent discoveries in the life sciences. A lesson plan for “A New Frontier” video (one of five videos being produced to explain concepts in systems biology) is under development.
Program Director: Jacqueline T. McDonnough, Ph.D.
Award Years: 2007
Summary: Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine is an academic medical center in Richmond, Virginia. Its HHMI-funded educational initiatives include:
- The development of five new science videos and accompanying classroom lessons as additions to its successful educational campaign, “Secrets of the Sequence,” an Internet video series that highlights scientific advances and helps teachers apply genetic research across the biology curriculum;
- The creation of week-long workshops to expand teachers’ knowledge in systems biology, family history and genetics, and research design. The workshops will enable teachers to develop strategies to help students understand fundamental processes of biological systems and design and conduct their own scientific investigations; and
- The development of science education programs for students in grades 4–12 in partnership with science teachers from four public school districts in Central Virginia. Many of the activities take place at Virginia Commonwealth University’s ecological field station on the James River and in research laboratories at its medical college.