High School Science Discovery Program

Lead Faculty: Blair Paul

Aquatic biomes can harbor incredibly diverse and abundant microbes, including the smallest members of Eukarya, Bacteria, Archaea, and their respective microbial viruses. In coastal environments, a single milliliter of water may contain 100,000 bacterial cells and tens of millions of viruses! But their numbers are very dynamic, being controlled by physical and chemical conditions, as well as the symbiotic interactions between microbes. These tiny organisms interact in various ways that can result in mutual benefit, or adversarial outcomes, and any of these interactions – even viruses infecting microbial hosts – can be considered a form of symbiosis.  In this course, we will explore the how filamentous and colonial cyanobacteria self-organize and interact with aquatic viruses. In the laboratory, students will learn techniques to visualize and quantify both bacterial cells and the aquatic viruses that infect them.  In the classroom we will discuss genome biology, introducing computational tools to investigate genetic processes in the context of symbiosis.  

Lead Faculty: Lisa Abbo

Other faculty: Carrie Albertin

The course focuses on the anatomy, development, and physiology of various animals, with an emphasis on local marine species. A mixture of hands-on work and lectures in methods for physical exams, anesthesia, and diagnostic sample collection give students an understanding of basic anatomy, disease, and health monitoring. Students examine a range of marine species from finfish to coral, and other invertebrates through dissection and imaging. They also observe organ system development during embryogenesis, with the opportunity to create time-lapse videos of zebrafish embryos and collect their own confocal microscope data to create 3D reconstructions of embryonic structures.  These lab activities will allow them to learn how current research scientists aim to understand how organs form during normal development, and how errors in this process lead to various birth defects.

Lead Faculty: Scott Chimileski

In this course we will visualize the hidden microworld. Thousands of kinds of bacteria and other microorganisms live across different sites of the human body, within microbial communities known as microbiomes. Students will have the opportunity to collect microbial biofilms from their own tongue, and then learn a special way to prepare the samples that will allow us to capture images showing many common human oral bacteria simultaneously, each labeled with a different color. We will analyze the images to understand how the human tongue microbiome functions as a microscopic ecosystem, where the different bacterial species interact with one another. We will also discuss why these microbial ecosystems are considered a normal part of the body, found on every person today and throughout history, and how they can be beneficial for human health.  

Lead Faculty: Kristin Gribble

Organisms are subject to a wide range of environmental stressors, such as temperature changes, food limitation, high population density, and exposure to chemicals. How organisms change, adapt, and evolve to meet these challenges, and how those adaptations affect individuals and populations on both short and long time scales, are fundamental question in biology.

In this course, students will use aquatic organisms to explore the fundamentals of evolutionary biology, including concepts of adaptation, fitness, genetic heritability, and natural selection. We will investigate how organisms alter their life history strategy to adapt to environmental conditions. Additionally, we will learn how studying such traits and mechanisms in diverse species can help us to understand human biology and health.

Laboratory techniques used in the course will include designing experiments, microscopy, growing marine organisms, analysis of behavior, basic molecular biology methods, and data analysis. By the end of the course, students will have gained exposure to some of the central questions and theories in biology and will have participated in the research process to address these questions.

Lead Faculty: Carrie Albertin and Scott Bennett

This course will allow students to not only learn how CRISPR/Cas9 technology works, but to apply the technique in the lab to understand how it is used by research scientists to explore questions in basic biology, and the techniques implications for improving human health. Genome editing will be used to explore the development of the zebrafish, Danio rerio, a key species in biomedical research worldwide.  Students will manipulate genes involved in development to understand embryogenesis and organ formation, and how this research is directly connected to understanding human health and birth defects.  The course will also expose students to modern methods in microscopy. Finally, will also discuss the ethical implications of genome editing, an issue that is highly relevant to all members of society.

Lead Faculty: Emil Ruff

Microorganisms are abundant in all ecosystems of Earth’s biosphere and their activity is critical for global biogeochemical cycles. In this course we will focus on the role of microorganisms as planetary engineers, review their impact on the evolution of the biogeosphere, and investigate key microbial populations in environmental samples. Firstly, we will visualize and count viral particles in seawater. These viruses are important for the functioning of the ecosystem and evolution of the biosphere. Then, we will investigate methane-cycling microorganisms in freshwater, which are actively involved in the production or consumption of the potent green house gas methane. We will get an appreciation for microbial processes on a planetary scale and the importance of microbes and viruses for the health and functioning of the biosphere. Especially, in times of a global crisis caused by a microscopic virus, it is important to understand that the vast majority of microorganisms and viruses are not only beneficial, but critical for the stability of ecosystems on Earth. The course will communicate these fundamental concepts and introduce simple yet powerful techniques that are used to investigate the microcosmos.