Examination arrangement

Course content

The objective of the course is to train young researchers in the understanding of how systems approaches can help answer biological questions. A journal club can be an important instrument to build a systems biology community and to broadly discuss and introduce new concepts and technologies for biological research. In a journal club format, PhD students (but other interested parties may participate) will select, with the help of their supervisor, recent scientific publications related to systems biology/systems medicine/integrative biology. If the number of students is large enough they will, in teams of 2, read, discuss and understand the paper content and convert the highlights to a formal presentation. They will present this paper to an audience of interested students and staff (usually in a faggruppe seminar series). The presentations will contain a detailed analysis and review of the work. The focus will be on discussing recent advances in systems biology approach, and discussions of possible shortcomings and improvements of the procedures used in the paper.

The course will span two semesters, and will cover four thematic areas, or sections: -omics, data integration, dynamical modelling and systems biology-based experiment design. This means that the majority of the papers discussed in such a section will be related to this area. Students will discuss the content and form of their presentation with the teacher, prior to giving the presentation, and after the presentation they will receive formative feedback on their dissemination practices.

Learning outcome

The objective of the course is to train young researchers in adequate dissemination practices. Students will also acquire knowledge about applying systems approaches to address specific biological questions. The course provides students training in efficiently reading and understanding scientific publications, reduce their content to a few highlights and present and discuss these with their peers. The course provides the PhD students with advanced knowledge about e.g. novel omics technologies, data analysis and integration approaches, systems modeling and systems biology based experiment design.

Learning methods and activities

Presentations and discussions will be in English. Students will be judged on their presentation skills, the progress that they made over the course of two semesters and the collection of presentations that they produced.

Mandatory activities:

• Reading papers
• Presentations
• Attendance will be mandatory, with a minimum required attendance per period of 80%.
• Each student will be expected to present at least 5 times.
• Presentations will be made available internally; short summaries of the presented work will have to be provided together with the presentation. These will serve to score the performance of students.

The course is given every second year, with teaching beginning in the autumn semester.

Lecture hours: 5

Seminar hours: 70

Further on evaluation

Assessment consists of presentations and work in relation to the presentations (paper reading, short summaries).

Recommended previous knowledge

Molecular Biology, molecular cell biology, biotechnology, molecular medicine, basic knowledge of statistics will be required.

Course materials

Recent scientific publications in the field of systems biology and systems medicine