BIO

320 - Genetics.
LECTURES

Course Information

Spring 2015

Tuesdays and Thursdays, 2:30-3:50 p.m. Javits 100

INSTRUCTORS & OFFICE HOURS

Maurice Kernan (course director)

CMM 447
Research: Genetics of the mechanical senses in Drosophila

Tues & Thurs 4:05 5:05pm; Weds 1:00-2:00pm

Maurice.Kernan@stonybrook.edu (2-9964)

J. Peter Gergen

Mondays 11:30am 2:30pm

john.peter.gergen@stonybrook.edu

CMM 436
Research: Genetics of development in Drosophila

TEACHING ASSISTANTS & RECITATIONS

Graduate TAs:

Frank Celeste Eric Lavington Jia Shen

Undergrad TAs:

Nicole Casson Simon dOelsnitz Jheison Giraldo Brian How Saneeta Monzy

TAs are graduate students in the Genetics Ph.D. program, and undergraduates who have taken the course and earned an A.
They hold recitation sessions throughout the week, in which they will explain difficult concepts, help you solve problems,
and work with you on some extra credit assignments. Recitations start on 2/2, and continue through the last week of
classes. The schedule of recitation times and rooms is posted on Blackboard. You can attend as many different sessions as
you want, as often as you want. This is free tutoring: take advantage of it!

MATERIALS & RESOURCES

TEXTBOOK: Genetics: From Genes to Genomes, by L.M. Hartwell et al., 5th edition (2014). McGraw-Hill.
th

A discounted softcover version, which includes the complete 5 edition, can be purchased at the University Bookstore. The
5th edition has been substantially updated and rewritten, and we negotiated with the publisher and bookstore to reduce
the price of the Stony Brook version as much as possible. If you are buying a text, we strongly recommend this edition,
th
which has been substantially updated and rewritten. Copies of the 5 edition are on reserve in the Science and
th
Engineering Library. If you already own the 4 edition, it may be usable in combination with your notes.
Supplementary book: Genome: the autobiography of a species in 23 chapters, by Matthew Ridley. Any edition is OK; used
copies available online or at the Bookstore. This book is optional. It is a well-written, interesting read which helps put
much of what you will learn into a broader human context.
Other assigned readings: may be posted on the Blackboard site during the semester.
RESPONSE PAD (clicker): Turning Technology. Clickers are used to answer questions in class for extra credit, and are
available at the Bookstore. Your clicker must be registered in BIO320, on the course website on Blackboard (below).
Under Tools, click on Turning Account Registration (clickers) and follow instructions.
COURSE SITE: on Blackboard at http://blackboard.stonybrook.edu/. Please contact Dr. Kernan if you have any problems
accessing the site. Course ANNOUNCEMENTS (e.g., if class is cancelled for any reason) are posted here. Also posted:
Syllabus and learning objectives (DOCUMENTS)
Course information (this document) (DOCUMENTS)
Recitation Schedule (DOCUMENTS)
Powerpoint slides (DOCUMENTS).
Copies of midterm and final exams from a previous year (DOCUMENTS)
Study guides (DOCUMENTS). Each includes a short overview of an area covered by a set of lectures, learning objectives
(what you should know and be able to do), and a checklist of terms and concepts.
Question banks (DOCUMENTS) Questions compiled from old exams and arranged by lecture topic. Answer keys are
posted separately. These are your most valuable study aids: attempting the problems (before looking at the answer
keys!) is the best way to test your understanding of the material and to practice for exams.
Discussions. Here you can post, and respond to, items for discussion, queries about the course material, or specific
problems from the question banks (include the problem number in the title). TAs and professors will review all posts
and also respond if needed.
Extras: Links to news stories and other resources involving genetics.
Echo recordings of class lectures: These can be viewed (online only, no downloads) in the ECHO CENTER. Echo
recordings are useful for review, and a backup if you miss a class. They are not a good substitute for coming to class:
we find a consistent correlation between exam scores and attendance at lectures. Also, you must be at the lectures
to answer clicker questions for extra credit. Occasionally the Echo system fails, and the lecture is not recorded.
Material in any unrecorded lectures will still be covered in exams.

EXAMs, SCORES, EXTRA CREDIT and GRADES.

EXAMS: Your grade is based mainly on your results in two in-class midterm exams, each weighted at 30%, and a
comprehensive final exam, weighted at 40%. Midterm exams comprise 20 multiple choice questions worth 4 points each,
and short answer questions worth a total of 20 points. The final comprises 50 multiple-choice questions worth 2 points
each. It covers all course material, but includes extra questions on lectures 21-26.
Exam

Day

Time & place

Covers

Midterm 1:

Thursday 3/5

in class (Javits 100) Material presented in lectures 1-10.

Midterm 2:

Tuesday 4/21

in class (Javits 100) Material presented in lectures 11-20.

Final:

Monday 5/18

11:15-1:45 (Javits 100) Comprehensive, with extra emphasis on lectures 21-26.

Please check NOW that there are no conflicts between the BIO320 final and your other final exams. Having several finals
the same day is not a valid excuse for missing the BIO 320 final.
The last day to drop a course without tuition liability is Feb 1; the last day to withdraw or opt for G/P/NC grades is April 3.
Missed midterm exams. There are no make-up midterm exams. If you miss a midterm exam for an unavoidable and
documented reason, you will be given an excused absence. (Studying for the MCATs is not an accepted excuse for
missing a midterm; please plan accordingly.) Documentation of the reason for your absence must be given to an
instructor before the end of the semester. Your combined exam score will then be calculated from your scores on the
other midterm exam (weighted at 43%) and the final exam (weighted at 57%), corrected for any differences between the
class average scores for those exams and the missed exam. For example, if you miss Midterm 2, the calculation would be:
combined exam score = 0.43(MT1)(MT2avg/MT1avg) + 0.57(F)(MT2avg/Favg), where MT1 and F are your scores out of 100 for
the first midterm and the final, and MT2avg and Favg are the class average scores for midterm 2 and the final.
You MUST take a final exam. If, for valid documented reasons, you cannot take the scheduled final, you may take a
make-up final on a date to be arranged between you and the instructors. Make-up final exams have the same format and
standard of difficulty as the scheduled exam. You will be given an Incomplete (I) grade until the make-up exam is scored.
Incompletes automatically change to F if the make-up is not completed by a deadline in the fall semester.
If you are ill on the day of an exam to a degree that will affect your performance, do not attempt to take the exam! We
will not retroactively change or drop any recorded exam score for any reason. Instead, you should stay home, get well,
and seek an excused absence for a midterm, or schedule a make-up for the final.
ACADEMIC INTEGRITY
We take seriously our responsibility to give all students an accurate and fair evaluation of their performance in the course.
We therefore have a zero tolerance policy towards cheating. Anyone caught cheating in any way will be given an F for
the course and reported to the Academic Judiciary Committee. To ensure exam integrity, cell phones and all electronic
devices, except for simple calculators, must be turned off and put away during exams. University policy regards receiving
any cell phone call during an exam as cheating. (As a courtesy to the instructor and the other students in the class, we
also ask that all cell phones be silenced during lectures.) Answering clicker questions with someone elses response pad
is cheating, by both parties.
EXTRA CREDIT: clickers and other activities.
Up to 5 exam score points can be earned as extra credit during the course, by answering questions during lectures with a
clicker registered to you, or completing other activities. The first week of class will be practice only: clicker questions will
be asked and answered, but not scored for credit. Starting with the third lecture (February 3), students will receive 2
clicker points for the correct answer to each question, 1 clicker point for an incorrect answer, and 0 clicker points if no
answer is recorded. Extra credit points will also be given for other specified activities - for example, reading an assigned
paper and posting comments on it in Blackboard (Discussions), or completing a genetic code puzzle in recitation sections.
At the end of the course, the fraction of possible extra credit points scored, from all sources, is calculated and multiplied by
5 to determine the number of extra credit points. For example, if 60 clicker questions were asked during the semester,
and you answered 31 questions correctly, 19 incorrectly and did not answer 10 questions, you would score 62 + 19 = 81.
If 30 points were available from other activities, and you received 25 of these points, you would have a total of 106/150
clicker points. These would be converted to extra credit points as: 106/150 = 0.707 x (5) = 3.5 extra credit points.
Extra credit points are added to your combined (midterms + final), weighted exam score after the curve is set, potentially
enabling you to move up a grade level. For example, if the cutoff for an A- is 82.0 and a students weighted exam score is
79.0, having 3.2 extra credit points would change the students grade from a B+ to an A-. Extra credit points do not affect
the curve, which is based only on exam scores. Therefore if one student moves up a grade due to extra credit, this does
not negatively affect anyone else because this does not change the curve. Every year approximately 1/3 of the class
moves up a grade level due to extra credit.

Some clicker questions may be posted (without answers) in the Documents section of the Blackboard website. It is a good
idea to try to figure the questions out before lecture. You may take them to recitation sessions to find out how to do
them as well. There will also be additional clicker questions that are not posted in advance.
It is your responsibility to have a registered, functioning clicker in class. Be sure to check the batteries, carry spares, and
bring your clicker to every lecture. Only those questions answered during class with a functioning clicker will be counted.
No credit will be given for low batteries, or forgotten or non-working clickers.
We encourage you to discuss clicker questions with each other - but you must answer using your own clicker. Using a
clicker that is registered to someone else, or having some else answer using your clicker, is academic dishonesty.
Anyone found doing this will be given an F for the course and reported to the Academic Judiciary Committee.
GRADE ASSIGNMENT
Grades are based on the sum of your combined weighted exam score (maximum 100.0) and your extra credit points
(maximum 5.0). This overall score (maximum 105.0) is compared to threshold scores (second column in the table
below), and to a curve based on the class distribution (third column); the lower of these standards will apply at each
grade level. There are also minimum scores for A, C and D (pass) grades: independent of the curve, an A will be assigned
only for an overall score of at least 82.5, a C only for an overall score of at least 45.0, and a D only for an overall score of
at least 35.0.
Grade for an overall
score that is
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
D
F

equal to or greater than

either this threshold
85.0
82.5
80.0
72.5
70.0
65.0
50.0
40.0

or the score corresponding to this percentile, in the

class distribution of combined exam scores.
th
~ 92.5 percentile, but not lower than 82.5
th
~ 90 percentile
th
~ 85 percentile
th
~ 75 percentile
th
~ 70 percentile
th
~ 60 percentile
th
~ 30 percentile, but not lower than 45.0
th
~ 20 percentile, but not lower than 35.0
th
< 20 percentile or lower than 35.0

All percentile values are based on the number of students registered in the class at the first midterm exam, but the
percentile-based score boundaries are known only after we have the final exam results. Each boundary may be slightly
adjusted up or down, to match the larger gaps in the class score distribution.
The only sources of extra credit points are clickers and specified activities available to all students during the semester.
There is no make-up extra credit available after the semester. All sources of extra credit total no more than 5 overall
points.
Letter grade assignments are based only on overall score, and strictly follow score ranking. No-one will receive a letter
grade that is higher than anyone else with an identical or greater overall score.

A STRATEGY FOR SUCCESS.

This course emphasizes the application of knowledge. Some concepts, such as the principles of Mendelian
genetics, may sound familiar but the only way to be sure that you understand them is to apply the principles
of genetics to solve problems.
Therefore, a good approach to studying for this class is to (i) read the relevant material in the text before
lecture; (ii) participate in lecture, taking notes and answering all clicker questions; (iii) soon after each lecture,
review your notes and other materials. When you think you understand the main concepts, (iv) attempt the
relevant problems in the question banks and textbook; (v) check your answers against the key and take any
problems that you do not understand to a recitation section or to the instructors, and/or post a query on the
discussion boards on Blackboard.