Connecting Undergraduate Plant Cell Biology Students with the Scientists about Whom They Learn: A Bibliography

Abstract

W A 7E teach an undergraduate Plant Cell Biology class (BioPL 444) in the manner proposed by Jean Baptiste Carnoy (1884) when he established the first institute of cellular biology. That is, we integrate mathematics, astronomy, physics and chemistry as well as anatomy, physiology, ecology and evolution with cell biology. Thus, the students are expected to understand a wide range of sciences. We feel that the best way to understand cell biology and its corollary sciences is to take a historical approach and give the students a working knowledge of the scientists involved. Often students remember the science when it is accompanied by an anecdote, and we tell many stories about the scientists as we lecture. Where do we get all the stories? From books written by the scientists themselves. We provide the students in our course with a list of these books for them to read at their leisure. The students are not required to read any of these books during the semester. The books we selected were written for the lay public or a general scientifically literate audience. They provide the students with an enjoyable entre into the lives of the scientists, their personal philosophies, their senses of humor, their outside interests, the theories and experimental techniques they used, the results of their research, and the relationship between their results and those of the past and future. Most importantly, students learn the excitement of discovery firsthand from the pioneering scientists. They also learn the human elements that may capture their attention. For example they can learn that Humphry Davy, the discoverer of calcium and potassium, loved salmon fishing, wrote poetry, and experimented with the mood-altering effects of nitrous oxide. They