Course Syllabus

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BIO 112 Couse Syllabus

Course Description:

This course sequence, intended for majors, includes a survey of the biology and diversity of organisms and examines the basic principles governing evolution of organisms and interactions between organisms and the environment. The course sequence emphasizes classification, structure and function of organisms, ecological principles, and mechanisms of evolution.

Student Learning Outcomes:

Upon successful completion of the course, students will be able to:

  • Apply the processes of scientific inquiry including experimental design.
  • Carry out an experiment to test a specific hypothesis using appropriate controls.
  • Explain the essential elements of life, major hypotheses for life’s history, mechanisms for the diversification of life, and macroevolution.
  • Apply the tools of evolutionary biology to the analysis and evaluation of historical relationships among organisms.
  • Describe mechanisms of evolutionary change including micro-evolutionary forces that determine patterns of genetic diversity within species.
  • Provide evidence for evolution.
  • Evaluate the ecological relationships of organisms at the population, community, and ecosystem level.
  • Describe flow of energy within an ecosystem and the role of nutrient cycling in maintaining ecosystem integrity.
  • Explain fundamental prokaryotic replication, metabolism, and cellular structure in relationship to evolution of diversity.
  • Compare and contrast differences in animal development and life cycles.
  • Compare and contrast differences in plant development and life cycles.
  • Describe how plants and animals maintain homeostasis: water and ion balance, gas exchange, energy and nutrient acquisition, temperature regulation.
  • For major taxa of protists, fungi, plants and animals,
  • Identify major groups and arrange them within currently recognized taxa.
  • Compare and evaluate different phylogenies in terms of relationships amongst taxa.
  • Describe structural organization/morphology.
  • Identify and describe structures and relate them to their functions.
  • Classify individual representative specimens to phylum.

Course Content:

  • Overview of tree of life
  • Phylogeny/Evolutionary History of major taxa
  • Systematics and Taxonomy:  Classification schemes
  • Prokaryotes
  • Protists
  • Fungi
  • Survey of animal phyla
  • Survey of plant phyla
  • Animal Systems Structure:  Anatomy
  • Animal Systems Function:  Physiology
  • Plant systems structure: anatomy
  • Plant systems function: physiology
  • Animal Development and life cycles
  • Plant development and life cycles
  • Population Ecology
  • Population structure, growth, regulation, and fluctuation
  • Intraspecific interactions
  • Social systems and behavior
  • Community Ecology
  • Interspecific interactions:  Predator-prey relations, competition, symbiosis
  • Community structure and succession
  • Ecosystem diversity (Biomes)
  • Ecosystems ecology: Trophic structure
  • Energy flow
  • Nutrient cycling and ecosystem integrity
  • Conservation biology
  • Mechanisms of Evolutionary change:  Natural Selection, Genetic Drift, Gene Flow, and Mutation, and Nonrandom Mating
  • Population genetics
  • Speciation and Extinction

Textbook:

Great news: your textbook for this class is available for free online!
Biology 2e from OpenStax, ISBN 978-1-947172-51-7

You have several options to obtain this book:

You can use whichever formats you want. Web view is recommended -- the responsive design works seamlessly on any device.

 

Course Summary:

Date Details Due