Graduate Histology
CDB 550
WINTER 2008
Meeting time:
This course meets Mondays and Wednesdays from 9:00 am – 12:00 pm. Optional review sessions are scheduled on Fridays from 9:00 am –10:00 am (or later as needed) .
Location:
2739 Furstenburg (Lab E). There are some sessions that will be in alternate locations (noted in the course schedule)
Description:
By the end of the semester, we hope that you will have acquired a reasonable working knowledge of: 1) how cells associate to perform the functions for which they are specialized, and 2) how organized groups of cells (tissues) are arranged to form the organ systems of the body. This course presumes a basic knowledge of molecular cell biology such as that covered in the graduate cell biology course (CDB 530). Your required text contains a review of this material in Chapters 2 and 3. Alternatively, a cell biology text such the one by Lodish et al. or Alberts et al. may be a useful reference.
Course materials:
You are expected to learn histology primarily by studying the slides of tissues and organs using the microscope, all of which will be provided. In addition, the following materials should serve as sources of information necessary for you to understand the functional significance of the structures you view in the microscope:
- Required text: Michael H. Ross and Wojciech Pawlina, Histology: A Text and Atlas, 5th edition, Lippincott Williams and Wilkins, 2006.
- Required atlas: Barbara Young and John Heath, Wheater’s Functional Histology: A Text and Colour Atlas, 5th Edition, Churchill Livingstone, 2006.
- Michigan Medical Histology (MMH), a computer-based histology tutorial (CD provided)
- Electron Micrograph Collection (available online)
- Laboratory Manual (provided)
- Glass slide set and microscope (provided)
Note: This course is based on the medical histology curriculum, so many of the materials are the same as those for the medical students. However, we will follow a slightly different sequence than the order of the sessions listed in the lab manuals, so you’ll need to switch back and forth between sections in the manual for some of the lab sessions. The text and atlas are the same as those recommended for medical students so they should be available in local bookstores –if not, they can be easily obtained online.
Course Website:
Course information, reading assignments, powerpoints (PPTs) of lectures, and online quizzes/exams are on the course website: http://www.med.umich.edu/gradHistology.
A CTools site (at: https://ctools.umich.edu) has also been created for this course for those of who you like keeping track of your schedule through CTools.
Virtual Microscopy:
In addition to glass slides and microscopes, there is now a virtual microscopy resource that we would like to use provided everyone has easy access to a computer that can run Windows XP. Virtual microscopy allows you to view representative slides that have been scanned on a microscope and digitally assembled into a single image on which you can pan and zoom on any area. It is also possible to annotate features of interest on the digital slides and may potentially allow an additional way (in addition to quizzes and exams) to assess your performance in the course.
Class Sessions:
Lectures: All lectures will be available as PPT files on the course website. Prior to each class, please download and print handouts of the PPT files (since many of the slides will contain figures, choose the “4 frames” option when printing the handouts).
Lab sessions: Labs will follow each lecture (after a ~10 minute break) and will be staffed by Matt Velkey and (if available) faculty giving the lecture. During the lab sessions, you should work through the material in your lab manuals, paying particular attention to underlined items.
Prior to each Lecture/Lab session it is expected that you will have read through the material assigned in your text, atlas, and lab manual and are prepared for each lab session. Bring your atlas and lab manuals to each class session.
Office hours:
Faculty who lecture in the medical histology course will give similar lectures in the graduate histology course. If you have questions regarding the content of a particular lecture/lab session, please contact the faculty member by E-mail.
Please contact Matt Velkey (jvelkey@umich.edu; 647-3990) if you ever have any additional questions or concerns.
Quizzes/Exams:
There are 4 quizzes administered every two weeks as well as a midterm and a final exam. The quizzes and a portion of each exam will be administered on-line on a secure website (currently in development; you’ll receive more details later). The electronic exams will consist of text and image-based questions (such as micrographs or diagrams) in either multiple choice and/or short answer format. The midterm and final exams will also have a practical component with ~30 microscope-based questions (again, either multiple choice or short answer) administered from 11a-12p on the scheduled class session. You will have at least 1½ minutes to answer each question. The final exam will cover only material from the midterm onwards in detail. However, on the final exam, you are expected to be able to identify any of the organs studied in the course.
Electronic exams and quizzes are closed-book and you will be asked to sign an honor pledge indicating that you have not receive or offered outside assistance. Due to potential overlap with the medical histology course, you should not discuss any quiz or exam material with ANYONE not enrolled in this course at ANY time.
Class participation:
Because we will be working with real tissues, you will find a degree of variability between the slide collections. In addition, there are often alternately stained slides of the same section (e.g. H&E versus Trichrome). You will be responsible for the alternately stained sections as well, so it is to everyone’s advantage to attend each lab. To help foster collaboration, a small portion of your grade will be based on your attendance and participation in lab.
Grading:
Depending on whether you submit annotations for grading, either 40% or 55% of your grade will be based on your 3 best quiz scores; 40% will be based on your exam scores; 15% will be based on annotations submitted for grading (if a student chooses to do so), and 5% will be based on class participation. In the event that a student chooses not to submit annotations for grading, the points will be distributed to the quizzes instead, making them worth 55% of the final grade.
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