Important: Always confirm offerings with appropriate Course and Time Roster
from the University Registrar.

Detailed course offerings are listed below (subject to change).

#15593

3 credits.  Prerequisite: junior or senior standing; any one of the following: PSYCH 2230 or BIONB 2210 or BIONB 2220 or two majors-level biology courses plus psychology course.  Two lec plus sec in which students read and discuss original papers in the field, give oral presentation, and write term paper.  Co-meets with PSYCH 7220.   Letter grades.  MWF 11:15-12:05.  E. Adkins-Regan.   location.  For description, see PSYCH 3220.

#15315

4 credits.  Prerequisite: BIONB 2220 or equivalent course in neurobiology by permission of instructor.  Recommended prerequisite: knowledge of biochemistry.  Offered alternate years.  Limited to 90 students.  S-U grades optional.  TR 10:10-11:25, Dis TBA.  R.M. Harris-Warrick.   location.  Introduction to neuropharmacology, with an emphasis on the neural mechanisms of psychoactive drugs. Topics include a brief introduction to neuropharmacology and a discussion of the major neurotransmitter families. The rest of the course covers the major psychoactive drugs, including cocaine, heroin, psychedelics, marijuana, and alcohol, as well as pharmaceuticals for the treatment of anxiety, schizophrenia, and depression. Includes a term paper in the form of a grant proposal to study a current problem in neuropharmacology.  The course will use i-Clickers, which the students should have before the first class.

BioNB 3960 - Introduction to Sensory Systems

#4825

3 credits.  Prerequisite: BIONB 2220 or equivalent.  Offered alternate years.  Limited to 25 students.  S-U grades optional.  TR 2:55-4:10.  R.R. Hoy.   location.  This is a survey course on sensory systems that focuses on how humans and other animals detect and process environmental information that guides adaptive behavioral actions.   Sensory function will be tackled from multiple levels of biological organization, from cell and molecular to sensory organs, to sensory systems in the brain, to sensori-motor integration, and finally to behavior.  Behavior analysis will include psychophysical viewpoints and the role of behavioral plasticity, including learning.

#15310

4 credits.  Prerequisite: BIONB 2210, one year calculus, course in probability or statistics, or permission of instructor.  Advanced undergraduates and graduate students.  Offered alternate years.   Limited to 25 students.  S-U grades optional.  TR 2:55-4:10.  H.K. Reeve.   location.  Intensive lecture and computer lab course on modeling strategies and techniques in the study of behavioral evolution. Population-genetic (including quantitative-genetic), static optimization, dynamic programming, and game-theoretic methods are emphasized. These approaches are illustrated by application to problems in optimal foraging, sexual selection, sex ratio evolution, animal communication, and the evolution of cooperation and conflict within animal social groups. Students learn to critically assess recent evolutionary theories of animal behavior, as well as to develop their own testable models for biological systems of interest or to extend preexisting models in novel directions. The Mathematica software program is used as a modeling tool in the accompanying computer lab (no prior experience with computers required). 

Lec#15316; Dis#15355

4 credits.  Prerequisite: BIONB 2220 or equivalent with permission of instructor.  Offered alternate years.  Limited to 25 students.  S-U grades optional.  MWF 10:10-11:00a, Dis W 9:05-9:55a.  C.D. Hopkins.   location.  Neuroethology is the comparative study of neural circuits used in behavior.  The course will emphasize fundamental principles in neuroscience using comparative examples drawn from invertebrate and vertebrate species.  Each case will emphasize a specific behavior and how neural systems are adapted to that specific behavior. This course will emphasize sensory systems:  vision, hearing, chemosensing, mechano-sensing and other unusual sensory systems.  Students will learn about the natural context of behavior and how sensory and other systems are adapted to solving behavioral problems.

BIONB 4360 - Neural Views on Mental Illness

#9124

Lec#16352; Lab#16353

4 credits.  Prerequisite: BIONB 2220 or equivalent, and permission of instructor required (contact Dr. McCobb, dpm9, for permission code to enroll in course).  Limited to 8 students.  Letter grades.  Lec TR 10:10-11:25, Lab W 1:25-4:25.  D.P. McCobb.  150B CMS.  Hands-on lab with lecture/discussions introducing cellular and integrative electrophysiological concepts and methods.  Intra- and extracellular recording of action potentials, synaptic transmission, voltage clamp and ion channel gating, and interactions between autonomic function and cognition in humans.  Lectures will discuss concepts, recent discoveries, and future prospects.  Written and oral presentations required.

BioNB 6702 - Topics in Behavioral Ecology:

(Sexual selection, sperm competition, and cryptic female choice)
#4782

2 credits.  Prerequisite: This is a graduate course, undergraduates are welcome, but must have taken BioNB 2210 and have permission of the instructors.  Organizational meeting, Thursday, 22 August, 2013, 5:00pm, A305 CMH; day/time TBD.  Limited to 16 students.  S-U grades only.  W.D. Koenig and J.L. Dickinson.  This course delves into theory and evidence for how Darwin’s theory of sexual selection manifests in a diversity of animals and plants.  It encompasses analysis of how competition for mates (usually by males) and mate choice (usually by females) have shaped mate location strategies, copulatory behaviors, genital morphology, insemination and sperm storage strategies, patterns of fertilization, and the morphology/physiology/behavior of sperm and eggs. We will focus on theoretical as well as empirical treatments of these issues with the aim of developing a background and deepening your scholarship in this important area of evolutionary behavioral ecology. This annual “living room seminar” requires each student to lead one session and provides a structured, but informal, educational setting for graduate students and advanced undergraduates (with permission).

BioNB 7210 - Introductory Graduate Survey in NBB

#1612

2 credits. S-U grades only. Concurrent registration in BIONB 2210 required. Requirement for graduate students majoring in neurobiology and behavior. W 4:30-6:00. A305 CMH. K.L. Shaw and staff.  A two-semester, graduate-level seminar with presentations from lecturers in BIONB 2210 and BIONB 2220. Discussions of current research in the area of neurobiology or behavior that have been presented in the lecture class. A lab project and/or a writing component each week could be assigned to ensure engagement with the material.

BioNB 7640 - Plant-Insect Interactions Seminar

#4493

1 credit.  Prerequisite: Permission of instructor is required for undergraduates.  S-U grades only.  TBA.  Staff.   location.  For description, see BIOEE 7640.

BioNB 4200, Dis 201- Animal Migration, Navigation and Homing: Sensory Aspects

#15608

2 credits.  Prerequisite: Course in biology.  Letter grades only.  TF 1:25-2:15.  Limited to 12 students.  C. Walcott.  CMH A305.  In this class we will consider what cues animals use to orient.  Orientation may be over short distances, like a mite trying to find the ear of a moth, or long distance as in an Arctic tern in its yearly travels.  The exact topics to be considered will depend on the interests of the members of the class.

BioNB 4200, Dis 202- The Neurobiology of Attraction

#16116

2 credits.  Prerequisite: BIONB 2220 or equivalent.  S-U grades only.  W 2:55-4:10.  Limited to 15 students.  A.H. Bass.  CMH W358.  This course will explore the evolutionary origins of brain traits that underlie social attraction, both physical and psychological, between humans. Readings will be from the primary literature and from the book, The Chemistry Between Us by Larry Young and Brian Alexander (2012, The Penguin Group).

BioNB 4200, Dis 203 - (co-meets with MUSIC 1212) - Music on the Brain

#16566

3 credits.  Prerequisite: Permission only (to register through BIONB contact rrh3 for enrollment code).  S-U grades optional.  TR 10:10-11:25, Lab W 12:20-1:10 or 1:25-2:15.  Limited to 16.  A.P. Lewandowski and R.R. Hoy.  Location.  Our auditory scene is populated by natural sounds, animate and inanimate and from human activities, unintended and intended, including language and music.  Musicians draw inspiration from them.   Are we aware how our brain shapes our perceptions as well as our musical tastes? Evolutionarily, where does music from--is making language and making music related?  Is the trained musician¹s brain different from a non-musician¹s?  The temporal and harmonic structure of music is codified--how does it reflect the brain¹s processing ³power?   How far can we stretch the psychophysical properties of sonic/musical materials and still make music?  We will explore familiar elements of musical composition and creation in relation to our ears and brain.  Finally, is it only humans that make “music?”  What about the birds, crickets, whales, and the many other animals that use acoustical signals to communicate with each other?   The lab/discussion will tackle practical projects that analyze and manipulate sound to better understand what it means to make music.

BioNB 7200, Dis 201 - Academic Skills for Biologists

#16654

2 credits.  Prerequisite: Intended for graduate students.  Permission of instructor (contact Prof. Adler, kka4, for permission code to enroll in course).  S-U grades only.  W, 2:55-4:10.  Limited to 12 students.  K. Adler.  CMH A305.  In-depth discussions of career choices for academic biologists to permit them to become the manager of their own career.  Topics to be covered include writing resumes, choices of graduate schools and postdoctoral posts, applying for faculty positions, interviewing, dual careers, where to publish, grant administration, dealing with editors, and tenure and promotion, among other topics.  Discussions will be structured around the text “Survival Skills for Scientists,” by F. Rosei and T. Johnston (Imperial College Press, London, 2006).  The last few sessions will be left open for discussion of topics chosen by the participants.