Any comments, e.g. on specific parts of the course:
Some basics regarding differential equations and stochastic stuff would be a plus. The pdf on kursbunt regarding differential equations does not fall within "clearly explained for engineers/dummies" category. Neither does wikipedia nor MIT OpenCourseWare. A quick and to the point guide is much needed (no more than 5 pages).
---
Beginning of the course was fine. But I could not pick up last few lectures well. May be because It was very new to me.
---
Alldels för mycket tid på labbar och själva programmeringen. Målet med labbarna blev diffust.
Any comments, e.g. on specific parts of the course that are missing or could be excluded:
The whole calcium chapter is overly long and complex in my opinion. If I were to change anything, that would be the first chapter to revamp.
A more engineering-related view on the course would be really interesting. The balance between theory/math and real-world practice is quite unbalanced.
For instance, an explanation on real life (big?) projects in this discipline, what the teacher/researcher is doing at the moment, would be really motivating and interesting.
I found the first class regarding "why model?" quite weak (IIRC, the slides are incomplete!), not in tune with the rest of the course.
Any comments, e.g. on specific parts of the course:
"As you may now, thermodynamics applies to biology as well"...
Well, I didn't (don't?) have any idea about thermodynamics, so hearing this on the first lesson really scared me... The webpage says that this course is targeted to physicists, I'm not, and that shouldn't be so lightly assumed in a multidisciplinary master, in my opinion.
---
the pre-existing knowledge for both- the subject and the labs is not sufficient. neuroscience for the subject and matlab for the labs is necessary
---
my background in chemistry and specifically stochiometry and also electrical circuits was not sufficient.
---
computational knowledge is not enough for me.
---
Det var en del saker som jag var tvungen att repetera, men det är väl som det ska. Det hade varit bra dock om man hade kunnat få tillgång till "Background material tips" och kursens läsanvisningar någon vecka innan kursstart.
Any comments on the book (write first Course pile, JW or Fall):
Course Pile: The part on calcium could be a lot better. This part should probably be replaced with something more accessible to beginning students.
---
Wu book should contain a big warning on the webpage: "Just covers a little part of the course, don't spend ~700Kr on it if you're not completely sure about your interest on this particular topic"
---
very few copies in the library (or should i say only one), could never get to see the book. and its pretty costly to buy one.
---
I think the JW book is more understandable in compare to other refrences and the course pile in my opinion is a little hard to understand.
---
Kursbunten: Vissa delar var inte alls tillräckligt genomgående. Särskilt fösta delen. Jag läste ett jättebra kompliment som jag kan rekomendera:
The Regulatory Design of Metabolism
An exercise in computational systems
biology
Jan-Hendrik S. Hofmeyr,
Centre for Studies in Complexity
and
Triple-J Group for Molecular Cell Physiology,
Dept. of Biochemistry,
University of Stellenbosch,
South Africa
c
2009
April 13, 2009
---
Det var väl bara den trycka bunten som var kurslitteraturen? JW var väl inte ett krav?
Any comments on the other course material:
Calcium chapter should be understandable for mere mortals.
This opinion was a shared one with at least 6 of the students of the course (did not ask more than those, so it's a 100% consensus... in this subset :)).
---
"Too little" i den mening att litteraturen (inte kursen) ibland förutsatte lite för mycket förkunskaper.
---
JW hade varit bra att ha, men kursbunten var ju "tillräcklig" enlig hemidan.
Any comments on the lectures:
The topics were covered, but the amount of learning during class at least for my own sake was fairly low. Questions did not always get the seeked answer. Should be more focus on really teaching rather than just plowing through the topics of the course. More fundamental explanations and derivations of forumals. How the results were achieved, like the cable eq, or the Michaelis-Menten eq's. I would seek a more step by step explanation during the lectures.
---
Really good teacher, always eager to give an understandable and highly interesting reply for each question.
Should work a little bit more regarding off-class availability though. One-to-one motivating discussions fire the interest for people on continuing this area of research, failure to satisfy this by "they don't pay me the extra time to solve this" arguments should be out of the question.
---
I think the lecture time is not sufficient for explaining the content clearly.
---
Undermålig engelska dessvärre av Erik, och det gör att föreläsningarna blir dåliga. Håll kursen på svenska. Utbytesstudenter får helt enkelt läsa sig vårt språk.
Any comments on the level of the lectures:
Labs are the rosetta stone for this course. I think that they are the single most important thing of it. Thinking of them about cryptograms waiting to be solved, you get deep on theory trying to understand what is asked.
Just a few blocking issues need solution:
* A clear "you should expect bistability and oscillations" on lab1 would be interesting.
* Euler method should be banned as an option, leads to inability to plot things reliably.
* "Sketch" question on lab3a should be rephrased.
Again, improved availability on lab support would be very much appreciated. "They don't pay us enough for this" and other student motivation-killer arguments, dismissed.
---
students with a different background find it very difficult.
Any comments on the labs:
The instruction for Lab 4 was not good provided.
---
There should be a radically new policy (much less bureaucratic) regarding questions. I find really annoying to wait for days for a question that I need solved *now* in order to keep going.
A direct free access to teachers/lab assistants would improve the student experience a lot, in my opinion.
---
I lab två fick vi spendera hysteriskt mycket tid för att få programmeringen att fungera. Hade varit bra med lite varningar. Tex att storleken på dt kan skapa problem när man gör sin egen euler forward funktion.
I lab 3 skulle man gärna vilja ha en beskrivning av vad ni menar med phase-portrait.
I lab 5 stämde inte komandona som gavs. Tex står det:
cp -pr /info/biomod02/lab4/lamprey, men det ska vara:
cp -pr /info/biomod09/lab5/lamprey
Över lag tycker jag att ni borde gå igenom och förtydliga labhänvisningarna för lab 2,3 och 5.
Lab 1 var jättebra som den var tycker jag.
Any comments on the project:
I liked the idea behind presentation, it has not only purpose to read article, but made me think about what we may do in future.
---
Interesting teacher comments/questions just after each presentation.
---
3 credits are too many for a presentation of a already published scientific paper. and 5 mins is a short time to explain a paper in a understandable manner.
---
I think the articles which are available for presentation are very hard to understand and some of them are not very close to the course topics(e.g. Ekeberg and Pearson 2005)
---
Det är bättre att hålla en föreläsning om något som man kan. Eller, så skall denna typen av presentationer hållas på kurser i entreprenösskap.
The slides on the webpage need an urgent cleanup.
There's no reason to keep incomplete or old slides. A coherent slide compendium (all written with latex-beamer, for instance) would be a pleasant read for the student and for google spiders, potentially raising the popularity of your masters program (SEO techniques).
Scanned pages (solved problems ?) should be replaced by proper Latex-formatted (or equivalent) transcriptions. They are unreadable by humans in the present format.
---
As the Computational and Systems Biology is very new and multidisciplinary field, students having different background come in this program. As I could see that there are more students from Computer science and Biotechnology background which is not enough Computational and Systems Biology. Computer science students needs Biology and Biology student needs computer science. Since this course starts at the very beginning, It becomes a big problem as this course combines BOTH. Solution to this problem is very important to make students more healthy.
---
There are students within two kinds of background in general--computational and biological. I thing it would be helpful if students make grounds for labs in different backgrounds.
Some biological background used in the lecture is covered by the biomedicine course too,e.g. neural system,enzyme reaction and so on. If these parts could be processed before the biomod course, it will helpful for the lecture,especially for students with computational background.
---
It would be good with deadlines on the labs. During the course (before the exam) there were only 2-3 times booked each labtime. But at the end of the course the times were all booked immediatly. And some people were reviewing lab 1 at the end of the course. Since some people can't plan themselves, you have to plan for them.
Also the labs were too large to only be 1.5 hp. Maybe you should lower the points for the project and add lab 5 to lab 1-3/4 and increase the points for the labs 1-5.
The labassistant dissapeared and didn't even answer emails BEFORE he went "pappa-ledig". And we only sent him 2 emails that he had asked for. In one email we had to send him a complementary plot and in one when he couldn't show up for a booked labtime and asked us to email him our questions.
Lab 2 and 3 were almost impossible to understand. They felt like they didn't belong to the course at all. Very bad instructions. Lab 1 and 5 were better.
Thank you very much!
---
Thanks, I hope my comments are useful to you :)
Denna sammanställning har genererats med ACE.