Director of Undergraduate Studies Dr. Robin Cooper featured in the Sept. newsletter of FUN- the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience (https://www.funfaculty.org/drupal/)

Director of Undergraduate Studies Dr. Robin Cooper featured in the Sept. newsletter of FUN- the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience (https://www.funfaculty.org/drupal/)

 

 

I N C R E A S I N G   A C C E S S   TO  E D U C AT I O N A L   L A B O R AT O R Y   P R O T O C O L S  

F O R   E V E R Y O N E. 

R O B I N  L . C O O P E R , P H . D . D E P T . OF  B I O L O G Y   U N I V E R S I T Y  OF  K E N T U C K Y

Reading the various requests on the FUN listserv for physiology and specifically neurophysiology labs is a reminder how nice it would be to have one repository for lab protocols or links to them. Journals such as Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology use to publish lab protocols back in the 60’s. Specialty journals specifically targeted for methods and teaching such as Association for Biology Laboratory Education (ABLE), National Science Teacher Association (NSTA) and JUNE are dedicated educational journals; however some student/instructor feedback on assessment to accompany articles is preferred. A journal which has garnered a lot of attention over the past few years is Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). Also, JoVE has a neuroscience category of educational experiments. As for other journals, one needs a subscription or join as member for access if the institution does not provide paid access. One can also submit educational content to an open resource and open peer review to an up and coming journal F1000Research (F1000Research: Immediate & Transparent Publishing for Life Scientists).

A way to insure a broad readership is if the authors pay for the open access. Another approach, as a class instructor, is to make a class project as an authentic research endeavor and provide substantial details on the methodology used. This way others can readily modify for their own class project on a similar preparation. Such under- graduate student based driven re- search projects can be submitted to journals such as IMPULSE
(The Premier Undergraduate Neuroscience Journal. https:// impulse.appstate.edu/issues/2017) and American Journal of Undergraduate Research (AJUR) by the students in the course. If the authentic research being addressed is substantial then even publishing in a research based journal while providing detailed methods can be an approach. Extreme care is needed to provide accuracy in student driven labora- tories for data acquisition and analysis.

Having a repository, such as a web site, to provide wide listing of easily accessible educational material will be beneficial. Below is listed a few of the educational media platforms on neuroscience and physiology laboratory exercises I have provided as open access through JoVE and other venues.

Representative publications:

Cooper, A.S., and Cooper, R.L. (2009) Historical view and demonstration of physiology at the NMJ at the crayfish opener muscle. Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). JoVE. 33. http://www.jove.com/index/details.stp?id=1595; doi: 10.3791/1595.

Bierbower, S.M. and Cooper, R.L. (2009) Measures of heart and ventilatory rates in freely moving crayfish. Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE) 32: http://www.jove.com/index/details.stp?id=1594 , doi: 10.3791/1594.

Cooper, A.S., Rymond, K.E., Ward, M.A., Bocook, E.L. and Cooper, R.L. (2009) Monitoring heart function in larval Drosophila melanogaster for physiological studies. Journal of Visualized Experi- ments (JoVE). 32: http://www.jove.com/index/details.stp?id=1596 ,

Leksrisawat, B., Cooper, A.S., Gilberts, A.B. and Cooper, R.L. (2010) Response properties of mus- cle receptor organs in the crayfish abdomen: A student laboratory exercise in proprioception. Jour- nal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). 45: http://www.jove.com/index/details.stp?id=2323doi:10.3791/2323 [PDF of paper]

Wu, W.H. and Cooper, R.L. (2010) Physiological recordings of high and low output NMJs on the Crayfish leg extensor muscle. Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). Jove 45: http://www.jove.com/index/details.stp?id=2319 , doi:10.3791/2319 [PDF of paper]

Robinson, M.M., Martin, J.M., Atwood, H.L. and Cooper, R.L. (2011) Modeling biological mem- branes with circuit boards and measuring conduction velociety in axons: Student laboratory exer- cises. Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). Jove. 47: http://www.jove.com/details.php?id=2325 , doi: 10.3791/2325 [PDF of paper]

Cooper, A.S., Leksrisawat, B., Mercier, A.J., Gilberts, A.B. and Cooper, R.L. (2011) Physiological experimentations with the crayfish hindgut. Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). Jove 47: http://www.jove.com/details.php?id=2324 doi: 10.3791/2324, [PDF of paper]

Baierlein, B., Thurow, A.L., Atwood, H.L. and Cooper, R.L. (2011) Membrane potentials, synaptic responses, neuronal circuitry, neuromodulation and muscle histology using the crayfish: Student laboratory exercises. Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE). Jove 47:http://www.jove.com/Details.php?ID=2322 doi: 10.3791/2325, [PDF of paper]

Holsinger, R.C., and Cooper, R.L. (2012). Effect of Environment and Modulators on Hindgut and Heart Function in Inverte-brates: Crustaceans and Drosophila. Tested Studies for Laboratory Teaching, Volume 33 (K. McMahon, Editor). Proceedings of the 33rd Conference of the Associa- tion for Biology Laboratory Education (ABLE).http://www.ableweb.org/volumes/vol- 33/v33reprint.php?ch=7http://web.as.uky.edu/Biology/faculty/cooper/labWWW-PDFs/ABLE%20MTG%20PAPER.pdf