University College London

This course covers basic evolutionary biology as applied in biological anthropology, covering evolutionary theory, socio-biology, and primate behavior. The course combines weekly lectures with tutorials, where students discuss key readings linked to issues presented in the lectures, gain scientific comprehension skills, and learn how to communicate scientific findings in biological anthropology to the public. Major topics covered include a summary of the history of the theory of evolution, genetics and heredity, sexual selection, nature and nurture, and human biological diversity; and an outline of the taxonomy, anatomy, ecology and behavior of primates, as well as primate conservation.

Students examine how we form opinions about the world, cases of conflict, diplomacy, and the role of non-state actors and major global institutions in creating/sustaining the world around us today. In particular, students assess the different assumptions within particular approaches to IR, their methods and understanding of who and what matters in global politics; how approaches conceptualizes international institutions, and the relationship between agency and international structure. Students investigate issues like whether there is equal sovereignty in the world today, what do we mean by "North-South relations" and the links between theory and practice. Key concepts include anarchy, sovereignty, power, hegemony and empire, the state, and the international system.

This course provides an understanding of the principles underpinning finite element analysis (FEA) and computational fluid dynamics (CFD). Lectures include basics of finite element method and current problems, challenges, insights, developments, etc., relevant to various types of applications of CFD in industry and research: Aerodynamics, F1 racing, gas turbines, internal combustion engines, weather forecasting, heat transfer, fundamental turbulence modelling, etc.

This course introduces students to the power of cross-disciplinary research. It discusses the contribution of chemists, microbiologists, immunologists, and physicists to solving cell biological problems. The course emphasizes the relationship between the chemical scale and more complex levels of organization in cells, and the balance of interactions required for cellular function. It explicitly recognizes the different understandings of cell biology in different branches of biosciences, including virology and microbiology in health and disease.

This course investigates questions that are both central to political philosophy and of current political importance. They include: What does it take for a society to be just? How can we come to own natural resources? and more. 

This course provides students with a thorough understanding of the nature and origin of igneous and metamorphic rocks, from their formation and distribution to their geological expressions and associations with particular plate tectonic settings. The course also builds on fundamental concepts of geochemistry and mineralogy to explain phase behavior in high temperature systems using quantitative phase diagrams and approaches. Integral practical classes use both hand specimens and optical mineralogy to understand diagnostic textures - which are used to identify and classify igneous and metamorphic rocks. The course provides an introduction to modern research practice in the fields of igneous and metamorphic petrology.

This course provides students with an in-depth understanding of innovation and its dynamics. It explores the determinants of innovation, drawing on theories to examine how and why innovation occurs, and the types of innovation that may emerge from different political economy perspectives and institutional frameworks. Part of the course involves examining policy evaluation and design, specifically discussing how to provide policy advice that considers the complex societal ecosystem, including societal hopes and fears.

The course covers different theories of human communication and utterance comprehension are discussed, including Gricean, neo-Gricean, and relevance-theoretic approaches. The specific topics and data discussed vary from year to year but are taken from the following list: referring expressions and speaker’s reference, conversational implicatures, pragmatic enrichments of explicit content, word meaning modulation, unarticulated constituents, indexical saturation, and non-literal uses of language (metaphor, hyperbole, metonymy, irony).

This course is for students who are new to the subject of pharmacology. The course provides an overview of pharmacology and some of the most important mechanisms of drug action; illustrates these actions for you with specific examples of important drugs; provides a foundation in some of the basic theory for pharmacology; illustrates some of the principles of pharmacology whilst providing basic laboratory skills and experience; and introduces principles of laboratory safety. 

This course introduces students to public health, a discipline which seeks to prevent disease and promote the health of populations through the organized efforts of society. Public health addresses complex health and social problems that are influenced by social, cultural, political, environmental, organizational, and economic factors. Students explore determinants that shape inequalities in health and explore how the organized efforts of communities and governments can help to ameliorate these. Students learn how different theories support public health practice and develop their skills in critically appraising evidence. They explore a breadth of public health topics – from sexual health to mental health - and include examples from low-, middle-, and high-income countries.