Biological Sciences Investigative Project

Overview

• Credit value: 30 credits at Level 6
• Convenor: to be confirmed
• Assessment: an annotated bibliography (10%), 300-word research question and hypothesis (10%), poster presentation (20%), laboratory and/or field notebook (10%) and 4000-5000-word research report (50%) 

Module description

The project provides excellent training and practice in core skills required by scientists working in the biological sciences sector. You will have an opportunity to apply knowledge, understanding and critical skills gained in earlier years of the course to a current problem relevant to the biological sciences. You will undertake a critical review of the scientific literature in a relevant research area, identified through discussion with your project supervisor. Based on this reading, you will formulate a research question, articulate an initial research hypothesis and identify a suitable activity (e.g. a survey, sample collection, database mining) to gather data required to support or refute your hypothesis. In tandem with in-depth independent research of the literature, you will undertake novel data analyses and interpretation.

You will have the chance to make your own decisions about how you gather relevant data, what control data are relevant, what types of data analysis and presentation are appropriate, and how analyses can be interpreted. An academic member of staff will oversee all stages, but you will be required to use your scientific judgment. You will have the opportunity to generate new knowledge, place your results in the context of what was previously known and articulate future research directions.

Learning objectives

By the end of this module, you will be able to:

• apply critical analysis skills to a research topic to formulate a relevant research question and hypothesis
• gain new knowledge by examining current primary literature relevant to a research question and synthesising this literature
• independently select and gather data from an appropriate source related to a specific research topic in the biological sciences
• interrogate data and information obtained so that valid conclusions are reached
• apply skills in experimental design to identify future research directions to further develop understanding of the research topic
• communicate complex and detailed scientific information clearly and accurately via a variety of different forms, including written reports, the production of scientific figures and figure captions, and oral presentations.