TEXTBOOK: Life on Earth by Audesirk, Audesirk, and Byers
COURSE DESCRIPTION: A course presenting many of the central principles of biology and relating them to everyday experience. Areas of study include biology at the sub-cellular and cellular levels, principles of inheritance, and processes of energy production and utilization with an emphasis on their relationships to human anatomy and physiology. Three lectures per week.
COURSE OBJECTIVES: Students in BIOLOGY 101 will demonstrate understanding of:
1. basic chemical principles and their application to biological molecules
2. the cell as the basic unit of life
3. structure and function of organelles and cell membranes
4. cell division and processes of mitosis and meiosis and the connection to continuity of life
5. principles of Mendelian genetics
6. structure and function of DNA
7. metabolic process of cells and the role of enzymes
8. processes of energy acquisition via photosynthesis
9. processes of energy release both aerobic and anaerobic
10. energy relationships of organisms at the ecosystem level
TOPICS COVERED:
- Introduction to the Scientific Method
- Chemistry
- Cell Structure
- Osmosis
- Enzymes
- Photosynthesis
- Energy
- Mitosis
- Meiosis
- Genetics
- DNA
- DNA-> RNA
- RNA-> protein
- Biosphere
