Biological Sciences

The course covers basic knowledge about immunology, and how different barriers interact to protect the host from infection or the development of cancer. Central and peripheral tolerance is discussed and placed concerning susceptibility to infection and hypersensitivity reactions. The principles of immunization are discussed and related to the vaccination debate in society and the role of the mass media in influencing public opinion.

This course examines a range of key contemporary problems at the interfaces between biology and the environment, health, and society. It helps students consolidate and develop skills including data analysis and presentation, making ethical judgements, and interpretation of data and statistics. It covers issues such as Measurement of Self, One Health, Forensics and Excess Mortality. 

This course provides an overview of the field of microbiology, with a focus on terrestrial diversity. The course mainly covers prokaryotic and eukaryotic microbiology, with a focus on their metabolism, environmental methods, and diagnostics.

The last few years have seen a remarkable increase in our understanding of the basic biological mechanisms underlying human neurodegenerative diseases. Identification of mutations in a variety of genes found to encode proteins present in neuro-pathological inclusions, has suggested that a common feature of all these diseases might be the intracellular accumulation of fibrous protein aggregates within neurons, resulting in neuronal cell death. This course will discuss this hypothesis in the light of contemporary research and provide a foundation for our current understanding of neurodegenerative diseases. It will focus on the genetics, cellular and molecular biology of Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s, Parkinson’s, Motor Neuron Disease and Prion diseases, with the main emphasis on the mechanisms leading to cell death. 

This course examines the practical applications of immunology and microbiology in biological research, clinical analysis and disease diagnosis. It covers application of antigen-antibody interaction in advanced research such as chromation; immunoprecipation assay, co-immunoprecipitation and dual immunofluorescence analysis; principles of flow cytometry and its application; tumor immunology and immunotherapy such as FDA-approved checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy and chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy; microbial pathogens and associated diseases, host immune response, antimicrobial agents and multidrug resistance, epidemiology and prevention of microbial infections; and clinical laboratory analysis in haematology, chemical pathology, and clinical microbiology.

The course covers human psychological development from childhood to old age and methods used in research in development psychology. It describes theoretical perspectives on personality and related fields of application. The course consists of four modules, this is the second module: Development in Adults. The module covers development during adulthood and the aging process based on theories of developmental, personality, and social psychology. Different aspects of aging are addressed, such as stress, mental and physical health, and ill health.

The course comprises a set of interdisciplinary lectures designed to enquire into the brain systems that are engaged during the experience of subjective mental states such as those of beauty, desire, and love. 

The course covers how the nervous system develops, its structure, and how it functions. The course consists of four modules with overlapping themes. The first module is about the development of the nervous system, the different cell types, and parts that form the nervous system, and the functions these have. In module 2, how neurons communicate with each other and how the brain can be changed as a consequence of experiences are learned. Module 3 is about how the brain takes in information from the environment via different sensory systems, how this information is integrated into the brain, and how the brain creates behavior through influence on muscles. Lastly, module 4 reviews how pharmacologically active substances can influence the
brain and how the connection functions between the brain, cognition, and emotions. All modules emphasize which methods are used to produce knowledge about the nervous system. Modules also contain practical components to concretize lectures and required reading.

This course deals with the inheritance, biological mechanisms, clinical presentation, and therapy of human monogenic disorders. Following a block of introductory lectures covering the fundamentals of Mendelian and epigenetic inheritance, various disorders are described by experienced scientists and clinicians, in order to illustrate different aspects of human genetics. Finally, the course covers approaches to gene therapy - the stated goal of most studies of human genetic disease.

This is an individual study project. Students must have a well thought-through idea of the theme of the study. A faculty teacher is appointed as supervisor, and an agreement is signed between the student and the teacher describing the title, contents, and ECTS credits of the study. A supervisor normally meets with the student between two and four times to discuss the progress of the individual study, or any problems encountered. Most supervisors also choose to read and comment on parts of the study. Students applying to do an individual study must submit a detailed project description with their application. Exams for Individual Study Projects may be oral, written or a combination of the two. This version of the course is worth 12 quarter units and corresponds to a workload of 412 hours.