Abstract
Many laboratory courses consist of short and seemingly unconnected individual laboratory exercises. To increase the course consistency, relevance, and student engagement, we have developed a research‐inspired and project‐based module, “From Gene to Structure and Function”. This 2.5‐week full‐day biochemistry and structural biology module covers protein expression, purification, structure solving, and characterization. The module is centered around the flavodoxin‐like protein NrdI, involved in the activation of the bacterial ribonucleotide reductase enzyme system. Through an in‐depth focus on one specific protein, the students will learn the basic laboratory skills needed in order to generate a broader knowledge and breadth within the field. With respect to generic skills, the students report their findings as a scientific article, with the aim to learn to present concise research results and write scientific papers. The current research‐inspired project has the potential of being further developed into a more discovery‐driven project and extended to include other molecular biological techniques or biochemical/biophysical characterizations. In student evaluations, this research‐inspired laboratory course has received very high ratings and been highly appreciated, where the students have gained research experience for more independent future work in the laboratory. © 2019 The Authors. Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 47(3):318–332, 2019.
Highlights
Common to many laboratory courses is the organization of the topics into shorter and seemingly unconnected or fragmented individual laboratory exercises
It should be noted that the NrdI protein is reoxidized by molecular oxygen, so uncapping the cuvette after reduction will result in reoxidation of the protein to the yellow oxidized form
The students observe the decreasing number of crystals when decreasing precipitant and protein concentration, and in some drops, an increasing size of the crystals. It should be noted for this protein, and for the given crystallization condition, that these crystals normally grow from precipitate, as can be seen from Fig. 8 panel 3, where precipitated protein is still present in the drop
Summary
Common to many laboratory courses is the organization of the topics into shorter and seemingly unconnected or fragmented individual laboratory exercises. Each exercise focuses on learning a set of skills or understanding a concept or approach where a certain biochemical system is chosen, while another system is chosen for the exercise. There are several recent examples of undergraduate biochemistry laboratory courses that have succesfully implemented a more integrated and research-inspired approach [1,2,3,4]. These courses cover different aspects of the biochemistry education and have different focuses with respect to topics, length, class size, and use of teaching resources. Several of the above mentioned laboratory courses cover purification and characterization of a chosen model protein, our course covers a unique combination of topics including protein expression and purification, crystallization, structure solving and analysis, and spectroscopic characterization of a redox protein, which is part of a novel enzymatic system
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