Introduction To Science Book
Saustin Grody
This is CS50x , Harvard University's introduction to the intellectual enterprises of computer science and the art of programming for majors and non-majors alike, with or without prior programming experience. An entry-level course taught by David J. Malan, CS50x teaches students how to think algorithmically and solve problems efficiently. Topics include abstraction, algorithms, data structures, encapsulation, resource management, security, software engineering, and web development. Languages include C, Python, SQL, and JavaScript plus CSS and HTML. Problem sets inspired by real-world domains of biology, cryptography, finance, forensics, and gaming. The on-campus version of CS50x , CS50, is Harvard's largest course.
This is where you describe briefly and clearly why you are writing the paper. The introduction supplies sufficient background information for the reader to understand and evaluate the experiment you did. It also supplies a rationale for the study.
It is important to cite sources in the introduction section of your paper as evidence of the claims you are making. There are ways of citing sources in the text so that the reader can find the full reference in the literature cited section at the end of the paper, yet the flow of the reading is not badly interrupted. Below are some example of how this can be done:
"Smith (1983) found that N-fixing plants could be infected by several different species of Rhizobium."
"Walnut trees are known to be allelopathic (Smith 1949, Bond et al. 1955, Jones and Green 1963)."
"Although the presence of Rhizobium normally increases the growth of legumes (Nguyen 1987), the opposite effect has been observed (Washington 1999)."
Note that articles by one or two authors are always cited in the text using their last names. However, if there are more than two authors, the last name of the 1st author is given followed by the abbreviation et al. which is Latin for "and others".
A Verified Certificate costs $219 and provides unlimited access to full course materials, activities, tests, and forums. At the end of the course, learners who earn a passing grade can receive a certificate.
Alternatively, learners can Audit the course for free and have access to select course material, activities, tests, and forums. Please note that this track does not offer a certificate for learners who earn a passing grade.
Science Literacy studies the role of science literacy in public support of science. This report synthesizes the available research literature on science literacy, makes recommendations on the need to improve the understanding of science and scientific research in the United States, and considers the relationship between scientific literacy and support for and use of science and research.
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Human beings around the world increasingly live in urban environments. In Introduction to Urban Science, Luis Bettencourt takes a novel, integrative approach to understanding cities as complex adaptive systems, claiming that they require us to frame the field of urban science in a way that goes beyond existing theory in such traditional disciplines as sociology, geography, and economics. He explores the processes facilitated by and, in many cases, unleashed for the first time by urban life through the lenses of social heterogeneity, complex networks, scaling, circular causality, and information.
Lus M. A. Bettencourt is Professor of Ecology and Evolution, and Inaugural Director of the Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation, at the University of Chicago. He is also External Professor of Complex Systems at the Santa Fe Institute.
MIT's Minority Introduction to Engineering, and Science (MITES) is a rigorous six-week residential summer program that introduces promising minority high school seniors to engineering and science. The program stresses the value and rewards of pursuing technical degrees and careers.
Through funding from the National Human Genome Research Institute, the Broad Institute sponsors a genomics research project and lecture series for MITES students. Last summer's research project included looking at genetic-based diseases, such as breast cancer, Rett syndrome, Werner's Syndrome or cystic fibrosis. Under the guidance of Broad researchers, the students found mutations in the diseased genomes and studied their effects. Lecture topics included recombinant DNA technologies, an overview of genomics research, the applied use of mathematics and computer science to genomics problems, and the ethical and social implications of genomics research.
Once selected, all educational, housing, meals and activity costs are covered for the full six weeks. Students, however, are responsible for transportation to and from MIT, and medical insurance coverage.
Students are chosen based on several criteria, such as high school grades, written essays, teacher recommendations, standardized test scores (PSAT or SAT I scores), participation in extracurricular activities and volunteer work.
The Drug Repurposing Hub is one of the most comprehensive and up-to-date biologically annotated collections of FDA-approved compounds in the world. Researchers anywhere can explore more than 6,000 drugs in the hub and search for possible new uses for them to jump-start new drug discovery.
The NeuroGAP-Psychosis project, a collaboration between the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health to study the genetics of severe mental illness, has recruited more than 42,000 participants in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, and South Africa.
This is an introduction to the opportunities and challenges of using large datasets for biomedical research. Topics to be covered include: What makes big data different? What big data can and cannot do. Phases of data science: getting data, merging and cleaning data, storing and accessing data, visualizing or telling stories with data, drawing conclusions from data. Introduction to supervised and unsupervised machine learning including detailed discussion of algorithms and model fitting.
Twice weekly pre-recorded lectures introduce the substantive content for each module, which is subsequently reinforced in weekly applied homework problem sets. Weekly computer lab sessions give students guided problems to work through and the opportunity to learn to use the software, ask questions, and have more interaction with faculty.
In addition, all students will be required to submit a final project in which they manipulate, clean, and analyze data emanating from a large data source. Students will be given a choice of datasets and guidelines for performing the project.
Introduction to Earth Science is a 530+ page open textbook designed to provide a comprehensive introduction to Earth Science that can be freely accessed online, read offline, printed, or purchased as a print-on-demand book. It is intended for a typical 1000-level university introductory course in the Geosciences, although its contents could be applied to many other related courses.
This text includes various important features designed to enhance the student learning experience in introductory Earth Science courses. These include a multitude of high-quality figures and images within each chapter that help to clarify key concepts and are optimized for viewing online. Self-test assessment questions are embedded in each online chapter that help students focus their learning. QR codes are provided for each assessment to allow students using print or PDF versions to easily access the quiz from an internet-capable device of their choice.
Adapted from openly-licensed works in geoscience, the sequence of the book differs from mainstream commercial texts in that it has been arranged to present elementary or foundational knowledge regarding rocks and minerals prior to discussion of more complex topics in Earth Science. Unlike prominent commercial texts for Earth Science, this book dedicates an individual chapter to each of the three major rock types, the processes of mass wasting, geological time, Earth history, and the origin of the universe and our solar system. Book content has been further customized to match the Pathways General Education Curriculum at Virginia Tech with a focus on Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) for Pathways Concept 4, Reasoning in the Natural Sciences.
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About the author
Laura Neser, Ph.D. is an Instructor in the Department of Geosciences at Virginia Tech. Dr. Neser earned her B.S. in Geosciences at Virginia Tech in the spring of 2008 and completed her Ph.D. in Geological Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) in 2014. Her doctoral research focused on the structural geology, sedimentology, and stratigraphy of formations that were deposited along the flanks of the Beartooth Mountains as they rose during late Paleocene-Eocene time. Dr. Neser has worked as an athletic tutor and online instructor at The University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, NC), in temporary positions as an Adjunct Instructor at Chowan University (Murfreesboro, NC) and Full-Time Lecturer at Indiana State University (Terre Haute, IN), and as a Professor at Seminole State College (Sanford, FL) before starting as an Instructor at Virginia Tech in the fall of 2021.