Welcome to Baliga Lab Education Site

Understanding Biological Complexity Using a Systems Approach


"The whole thing?" "We have to connect every component in the system?" "How do we represent the different kinds of relationships between components?" "Can I use a different geometric shape to represent abiotic nodes?" Such are the questions of engaged high school science students as they grapple with a systems approach to a scientific problem. Bellevue School District biology students, along with many other students throughout the nation, are not only grappling with understanding systems, they have also chosen to study an organism that lives in extreme environments.

 

Recent advances in experimental practice, accompanying computational techniques and systems thinking have advanced biological inquiry. However, the practice of today´s biology does not resemble how biology is taught in today´s high schools. The Baliga Research Group at the Institute for Systems Biology is using today’s practices to launch classroom activities that promote conceptual development of standards based instructional outcomes for students as a potential solution to this mismatch. Students are engaged by the forefronts of biological thinking and computation available in these materials.

Students will ultimately experience five modularized sets of instructional materials to shape their understanding of biology from a systems perspective. The links in this sentence will connect you with the materials development process, descriptions of completed materials and a primer on systems biology .

The Baliga Laboratory has collaboratively resourced the materials development effort. The collaboration includes practicing scientists, a school district, science educators, evaluators and granting organizations. A careful plan for evaluation and dissemination of the materials is ongoing.

A very important piece of the Baliga Lab´s educational work is a high school internship program. Each summer, two students join the research group to gain critical laboratory experience and to help optimize experiments for other students in classrooms throughout the nation.

What is Systems Biology?

Traditional biology — the kind most of us studied in high school and college, and that many generations of scientists before us have pursued — has focused on identifying individual genes, proteins and cells, and studying their specific functions. Although extremely powerful, this approach alone has limitations in the extent to which it can shed insights into how organisms function as efficient machines constantly modulating their behavior to best suit their environment.

 

As an analogy, consider a complex machine of many interacting parts such as an automobile. To understand how such a machine operates if one were to focus on individual parts, such as the engine, seat belts, and tail lights, one at a time, we would have limited understanding of how these different parts function together. More importantly, we would have limited understanding of how to effectively service the vehicle when there is a malfunction in aspects of interoperability between the various parts. Likewise, a traditional approach to studying biology and human health provides a limited understanding of how the human body operates.

Three Complete Modules

Ecological Networks, is typically taught in Biology, Biotechnolgy, Ecology or other life science courses for 8-12th grade students.  It consists of three subunits that can each be taught independently.  These subunits easily work together to teach students how to think on a systems level as well as how to apply that understanding to a case study involving an extreme environment.  In 2007, it was certified by WA State LASER (Leadership and Assistance for Science Education Reform) as exemplary materials according to their rigorous guidelines.


List of Credits