Syllabus of the lecture course Practical basics of scientific work (B130P16)

 

The course gives information on the basics of scientific practice in modern experimental biology. It is devoted to students in the second and third year that intend to study experimental biology specializations. The basics of research practice, planning of experiments, methods of their evaluation, principles of laboratory work, guidelines for writing protocols and ethical rules will be described in detail. Participants will be informed about useful techniques of mining in scientific databases and handling with these data as well as about scientific contribution preparation (poster and presentation, scientific paper). Practical demonstrations of techniques useful for bachelor and diploma work writing will be strongly emphasized.

Guaranteed by: 130

State: taught

Winter term: 0/2 C (hours/week)

Credits: 2

Valid from: od 2006

Capacity: unlimited

Teacher: Petrášek, J.

petrasek@ueb.cas.cz

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Winter term 2009: Wednesday  14:00, "gallery" PC room of Department of Plant Physiology, Viničná 5, 2nd floor.

The first lecture will be held on October 7. We can still shift the date and timing.

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Lectures of winter term 2008:

1. Basics of research work - presentation in ppt 16.10., 23.10. will be available soon.
1.1. The character of scientific work in the field of experimental biology
1.2. Observation and experiment - two general approaches
1.3. Scientific institutions and organizations, scientific conferences
1.4. Ethical rules of scientific work
1.5. Financing of the scientific research
1.6. Writing scientific projects and grant proposals, basic rules

2. Helpful hints in the processing of experimental data - presentation in ppt 30.10.

2.1. Organization of work, type of data
2.2. Data explorers, correct data handling and saving
2.3. Spreadsheets, statistical software, graph editors
2.4. Processing of structural and sequence data
2.5. Image analysis, graphical software, presentation software

 

3. Scientific literature, online resources at the internet - presentation in ppt 6.11., practical demonstration 13.11.

3.1. Types of scientific reports and their purpose
3.2. Internet sources of information
3.3. How to search for bibliographic records and full text articles
   3.3.1. Bibliographic databases accessible at our faculty
   3.3.2. Full text databases accessible at our faculty
   3.3.3. Creating your own database of references
3.4. Scientometry - a tool for the evaluation of quality and scientific relevance of  scientific work

 

4. Online information databases in the experimental biology - practical demonstration 20.11.

4.1. Sequence databases - tool of systems biology
4.2. Specialized sequence databases

 

5. Presentation of experimental results - presentation in ppt 26.11., presentation in ppt 11.12., presentation in ppt 26.11.

5.1. Bachelor thesis
5.2. Diploma thesis
5.3. Dissertation thesis
5.4. Scientific contributions at the conferences and seminars
5.5. Scientific report/paper

 

Tests for obtaining credits:

Test 1-3, example report of test 1

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Lectures of winter term 2007:

Basics of research work

Scientific teams and their structure, scientific institutions and organisations and how their operate.

Specialisation x universality of modern experimental researcher – advantages and obstacles

Observation and experiment, what we should know before visiting laboratory, basic rules of experimental praxis, protocols and every-day laboratory notes, critical usage of models and model organisms in these days biology

From the literature to the observation and experiment, their critical discussion and writing of our own scientific report.

Software and procedures in the processing of experimental data

Programs used in the processing of experimental data (images, numerical data)

Spreadsheets, statistical software, graph editors, graphical software, presentation programs

 

Scientific literature and other sources of data

Internet sources of literature, sources at our faculty, bibliographic databases, creating your own database of references

Types of scientific reports and their purpose - books, monographs, original articles, review articles

Bibliographic searches

Symposia and scientific meetings - technology and information transfer

Sequence databases - bioinformatics

Scientometry and for what it is good - HOMEWORK

Basic rules in diploma work preparation

Scientific councils, form of seminar and diploma work

Proposal of your diploma work according to your theme -HOMEWORK

Presentation of our experimental results I

Oral presentation and ho it should be presented

Poster presentation, presentation software, printing

Presentation of our experimental results II

Scientific report and its structure

Co-autorship, communication with editors, review proccess

Writing your own scientific report - HOMEWORK

Correct scientific praxis in social context
Lecturer: Prof. RNDr. Lubomír Nátr, CSc.

Ethical rules of scientific work

Individual and social justification of scientific work

Writing projects and grants, basic rules

Grant agencies

How to write a proposal

Scientific teams at our department

Going through your homeworks, credits