Proposal

Narrative

$19,928.40 in technology fee funds are sought to purchase equipment to enhance student research experiences in the Small World Initiative (SWI, http://www.smallworldinitiative.org/about/) in FAU’s Life Science Labs (384 students per academic year). SWI allows students to conduct individual experimentation (described below). Currently, the SWI teaching lab (SC 108) has six sets of manual pipettes for 24 students per lab, slowing the experimental process for each student. Funds are requested for eighteen additional sets of pipettes which would greatly speed the process of individual experimentation and allow time for additional experiments. Electronic pipettes would accelerate the preparation work by TAs, as well as, increase the accuracy of the reagents prepped by the TAs and used by the students. This would allow time for new experiments for the students, increase student experimental success and increase the amount of data collected. A microscope with an attached camera (and software) would allow all students in the labs to visualize all bacterial species collected and supply the students with images for their final presentations. A large refrigerator in the prep lab (SC 111) would make the chilled plates used by the students more accessible and prevent accidents in transporting these plates to the cold room on a different floor in the building. Two microwaves are requested; one for the prep lab (SC 111, that currently doesn’t have one) and one for the SWI teaching lab (SC 108) that has a very old inconsistent one. Life Science and its lab are popular science courses in the Intellectual Foundations Program (IFP) at FAU for non-STEM majors. Annually, the Life Science course serves ~1,800 students. Dr. Diane Baronas-Lowell is leading the Biology Department’s efforts to re-vamp its IFP courses by re-designing them with research and inquiry-based pedagogies that focus on enhancing student critical thinking skills. Pedagogical interventions in the Life Science course alone would affect 8,000+ students in the next five years. SWI addresses a serious medical challenge in the 21st Century, the lack of effective antibiotics for clinical use. SWI started as a Yale University course and became a crowd-sourcing project in 2013 offering students a genuine research experience in antibiotic discovery. SWI is currently in 252 schools (including high schools) in fourteen countries. Dr. Baronas-Lowell is an SWI Partner Instructor and implemented SWI in four Life Science labs at FAU in Fall 2016 and expanded SWI to eight labs the following spring. The program continues in eight labs in fall and eight labs in spring semesters. SWI students isolate and analyze 1,000s of bacteria from their own Palm Beach county soil samples. By the end of Fall 2017, these students preserved 180 new antibiotic-producing bacteria, determined the DNA sequences from 107 of these and contributed original data to SWI’s global database. Noah Kaplan will serve as the project manager. Noah has been assisting SWI since Fall 2016 and is a leader of the SWI team of graduate teaching assistants. Noah oversees all SWI equipment and leads lab preparation. Two previous SWI undergraduate participants, participated in undergraduate directed independent study (DIS) during 2017. Three undergraduate biology majors will carry out DIS during Spring 2018. How is this Project Aligned with the Strategic Plan? Goal 1: Providing Increased Access to Higher Education: By funding this lab equipment, non-STEM undergraduates throughout FAU will be engaged in hands-on basic research. It is well documented that such educational experiences help engage first time college students in coursework by enabling them to participate in citizen science and develop their critical thinking skills. Goal 3: Building World-Class Academic Programs and Research Capacity: With over 250 other schools, SWI assists their partner instructors in networking and dissemination of their results. SWI is a world-class academic program based on original basic research. Goal 4: Meeting Community Needs and Fulfilling Unique Institutional Responsibilities: By joining SWI, FAU is aiding in the search for novel antibiotics, a huge global threat to human health. Goal 7: Increasing the University’s Visibility: By permitting our undergraduates to generate original findings on novel antibiotics they will be able to submit research papers to the Undergraduate Research Journal at FAU (an online journal). Undergraduates will also be encouraged to disseminate their results at local and national meetings and to publish in national and international journals.

Facilities

There are no facility renovations or upgrades required. The equipment will be housed in the current microbiology preparatory laboratory (Sanson Building room 111) and SWI teaching lab (Sanson Building room 108).

Hardware Requirements

There are no hardware requirements.

Software Requirements

The software package that accompanies the microscope and camera is included in the camera cost.

Personnel Costs

There are no personnel costs; existing personnel will use the requested equipment. The Department of Biological Sciences will continue to support staffing with graduate teaching assistants as determined necessary.

Other Costs

Manual micro pipettes and electronic pipettes (Ranin) $17,548.40. Please see attached quote. Compound Trinocular Microscope, T490B, 40X-2000X Magnification, Halogen Light, Abbe Condenser, 2-Layer Mechanical Stage, High-Resolution Optics, Awarded No. 6 Among The Top 10 Microscopes 2016 (AmScope) $300* Microscope Digital Camera, MU300 3.0MP, USB 2.0, Includes Software and Reduction Lens (AmScope) $120* Refrigerator, 1000 Liter Display (35.3 Cu. Ft.) (Iron Mountain) $1,700* Two Microwaves, 1.2 Cu. Ft. 1000W (Avanti) $260* *Prices from amazon.com.

Timeline

If this proposal is awarded, the requested equipment will be ordered immediately upon receipt of the funds. There are no special installation procedures, so the equipment will be used instantly.

Sustainability

The Department of Biological Sciences will pay for further warranty extensions beyond the first year as well as service of the equipment. All consumables to be used with this equipment will be paid by the department. The department has dedicated Dr. Baronas-Lowell’s position to SWI and continue to pay for her ongoing participation in SWI-related training and activities including the 4th Annual SWI Conference in New Orleans in June where she presented FAU’s SWI results over the past year in a short talk and a poster that outlined the findings of a graduate teaching assistant on three novel soil microbes found on FAU’s Boca Raton campus. Both presentations were well received by members of the SWI community at the conference. The department will continue to support staffing with graduate student teaching assistants as determined necessary. Finally, the department has allocated a portion of the existing microbiology preparatory lab (SC 111) and a dedicated teaching lab (SC 108) to SWI.

Resource Matching

The Department of Biological Sciences will pay for further warranty extensions beyond the first year as well as service of the equipment. All consumables to be used with this equipment will be paid by the department. The department has dedicated Dr. Baronas-Lowell’s position to SWI and continues to support her participation in SWI training and activities. The department continues to support SWI with graduate student teaching assistants. Finally, the department has allocated a portion of the existing microbiology preparatory lab (SC 111) and a dedicated teaching lab (SC 108) to SWI.

Implementing Organization

The Department of Biological Sciences will implement this project.