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Biology 205 Guidelines for the final project.

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1. Organization and contents

Remember this is a web project not a term paper per say so there will be a lot of flexibility in terms of how you present the material. But here are some basic guidelines as to what your project must contain:

1. What is your project about? Introduce the problem you have investigated in your own words. Any ideas and data not your own must be clearly cited as to the source. For instance, if you are investigating a gene associated with a medical disorder, you should give a general introduction to the disorder, it's prevalence, symptoms and treatment. If you are dealing with another sort of problem such as a problem related to evolution, then clearly state the problem you investigated and why this and important problem

2. What is the connection to your problem with genetics? For instance, certain disorders such as a particular type of cancer are known to be connected to genetics because of various lines of evidence such as twin studies or pedigree analysis. You should summarize these findings in this section of your project. For projects related to population genetics or evolution you might look at some of the important papers and talk about the genetic techniques used to study the problem.

3. Summary of of information about a specific gene or genetic system associated with the problem. This should ideally include paragraphs about each of the following:
- A. Normal function of the gene and its mode of action if known.
- B. Size and location of the gene including things like number of introns, size of the coding region in base pairs, what chromosome is it own.
- C. Population genetics. What is known about the distribution of various alleles of this gene in different populations.
- D. Evolutionary relationships between this gene and other genes. Genes often belong to evolutionary lineages which diverge in part through gene duplication and other rearrangements. You might for instance want to do a blastp or blastn as we did for selected genes and scan the organisms where significant hits come up.

4. A list of general web sites dealing with the problem. If you are dealing with a human disease this should include any support groups or associations that people with the disease. For site you should provide a brief one paragraph review in you own words about what is on the site, the organization responsible for the site and if available, the author of the site and when the site was last updated. Provide at least two general sites.

5. A list of research web sites dealing with the problem that might be of interest to scientists including genetic counselors, medical researchers and other biologists. These site might include online research papers, home pages for research labs and scientists actively working in this area. Provide at least three research sites. Include review paragraphs for each one.

6. A list of print references from refereed scientific journals that you have at least attempted to read about the problem. Use APA or similar style for citing these. Again for each reference provide a brief summary for the general reader of the main points in the article. Don't just parrot the abstract but read the article and summarize the big points of the article in your own words. Provide at least three print references. Since you will often be focusing on with a specific gene related to the problem, then at least one of the papers you read needs to be about that gene.

7. How your format your web page is pretty much up to you, but keep any formatting and navigation simple. Don't worry about fancy animated buttons etc.

Looks like a lot but we will piece this project together in a stepwise fashion during the balance of the semester. Remember, this is not a traditional term paper. Brevity along with clarity are most important. What you are doing is providing a useful guide and summary of a particular problem for a general audience.

See the grading guidelines for additional guidance.

2. Citing material in your project

There are a number of different ways to cite material and you should look at this site from Purdue University:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_docelectric.html

This site provides links to discipline specific citation styles. I recommend that you use APA or CBE style. Both allow you to use a 'name year method of citing references which you may be familiar with. I do not recommend using foot notes to cite references. A good CBE source also cited by the Purdue is this one: http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/online/cite8.html.

Generally illustrations from government sources can be used by educational groups and other non profits (that's us), but if you use an illustration always provide a link to the source of the illustration. Also if you use an illustration from a private web site either an individual or commercial web site, you should e-mail the contact person to get permission. Contact me if you have any questions about using copyrighted material.

One technical detail. If you use illustrations from the web, please convert them to jpeg format and compress them to a reasonable file size. Often illustrations are not put on web sites in the most efficient way for display. See me if you need help with this.

3. Publishing to the web

To actually publish on the web your document will have to be converted from your word processing format to hypertext markup language or html. As you are working on your project, save everything in your word processor and I will work with everyone in terms of publishing on the web. I recommend that you use a recent version of Microsoft Word which allows immediate conversion from Word format to html, but you can work with most any word processor. If you do not have a computer at home let me know and we will find a sneaky way for you to save your material. :-)

If you wish to use power point, you may do so. Another possibility is to use Acrobat and make a pdf file. Html is more universal though.

Project presentations need to be ready Wednesday December 8.

4. Grading guidelines.

Component	Possible points	Earned points
Organization. Is the web page or pages clearly organized into logical sections and easy to follow?	10
Writing. Are paragraphs put together logically using complete sentences and is the text edited for usage and spelling?	10
Review paragraphs. Did you provide brief but clear reviews for all visited web sites covering the topic you have chosen?	15
References: Are web sites accessible and clearly referenced and are print references properly cited so that I or an interested reader can easily find them in the library? Do you clearly distinguish between your own ideas and those of another author?	10
Illustrations. Are any illustrations used well chosen and properly formatted and referenced?	5
Presentation: In your oral presentation, are you able to clearly articulate your main points and conclusions?	15
Balance: Do you clearly explain any controversies or uncertainties related to the problem your project focuses on? For instance there may be ethical issues or disagreements about the genetic basis of a particular disorder.	15
Depth of understanding: Do you have enough understanding of your project to handle questions from the class including your instructor?	10
Overall technical quality of presentation. Class votes!	10
Total	100

created 11/14/04 pgd.