National University of Singapore

This course highlights behaviors such as learning, sociality, territoriality, predation and defense, courtship and communication, with examples from across animal diversity. Students examine how behaviors have evolved to fit specific ecological conditions. Students gain an understanding of and empathy for animals and examine how animals live and survive in their environment.

This course covers the main concepts of data engineering, including data pipeline, data organization, efficient analysis of large data volumes, distributed data storage (depending on the system architecture, e.g., multi-core systems, multiprocessor systems, clusters), distributed and parallel data analysis, and map/reduce techniques and their generalization to distributed query processing. The course requires students to take prerequisites.

This course offers a broad survey of the evolution of travel and tourism, delving into its historical foundations and contemporary complexities. Students examine the history of travel and exploration and its impact on cultural exchange, empire-building, economic development, and global connectivity. Students trace the historical roots of the booming travel and tourism industry, and are introduced to contemporary issues related to travel consumerism, sustainability, and the influence of technology and social media. Students develop an understanding of the multifaceted nature of travel and tourism within the broader historical and contemporary context of societal, cultural, and environmental dynamics.

This course introduces students to the diversity of major groups of living organisms, and the importance of maintaining diversity in natural ecosystems. With emphasis on the need for conservation of biodiversity to maintain a balance of nature, the course highlights the biodiversity in the major habitats and vegetation types in and around Singapore.

This course traces the business history of Singapore from its origins as an East India Company outpost, as an entrepôt for regional and international trade routes to its current status as a global city and center for international finance and business. The course offers an introduction to business history and explores different case studies in the local context. These case studies range from ‘rags to riches' stories of early migrant communities, popular local brands, and present day entrepreneurs. Major topics include: trading communities, commodities, networks and migration, entrepreneurship, business culture, heritage, globalization, state, politics and business.

The course introduces students to important grammatical features of Classical Chinese. Lexical study and some knowledge of Chinese writing system will also be examined for their contribution to the understanding of Classical Chinese. The course focuses on the analysis of Pre-Qin literature. Classroom activities include lectures, group discussions and some take-home assignments. The course requires students to take a prerequisite.

This upper-level seminar course focuses on the history and historiography of the most consequential imperial nation-state in the world today, from its founding at the supposed end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949 to the Tiananmen Square protests and massacre in 1989. After a brief, synoptic overview of modern Chinese history until 1989 in the first two weeks, students spend the rest of the semester working through chronologically and thematically the major periods and issues in PRC history.

This course introduces and develops a financial geography perspective, understood as the study of the spatiality of money and finance, and its implications for the economy, society, and nature. It introduces students to the complexity and controversy of financial globalization, vocabulary of finance, drawing on research relating to the global financial system, financial centers of London, New York, Shanghai, and Singapore, and their geographical footprint. 

This course introduces the students to the basics of quantitative finance and targets all students who have an interest in building a foundation in quantitative finance. Topics include term structure of interest rates, fixed income securities, risk aversion, basic utility theory, single-period portfolio optimization, basic option theory. Mathematical rigor will be emphasized. The course requires students to take prerequisites.

In this course, students gain a fundamental knowledge of microbiology, and the experimental tools used. The course focuses on microbes and techniques for studying them, through a combination of theoretical knowledge and hands-on experiments. Students examine the invisible world of microbes, investigating microbiomes of skin, soil and water, and exploring the role of probiotics. The course includes visits to a microbiology-related industry and witnessing real-world applications of their learnings. The course requires students to take General Biology as a prerequisite.