Laboratory-based learning is increasingly considered to be an integral component of undergraduate education. However, students do not always perceive the value of laboratory learning in the college classroom. The current research sought to create an effective laboratory learning environment within a research methods course and to assess students'…

The forces of globalization and the development of English as a lingua franca have made many scholars and practitioners highlight the urgent need for foreign language literacy. The Norman M. Eberly Multilingual Writing Center (MWC) at Dickinson College addresses that need by offering peer writing tutoring in eleven languages. This profile explains…

Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) have become like hospitals where there are multiple offices in centralized locations. One of the areas that need further study is how to integrate these services effectively and efficiently to service students. Healthcare has developed the triage model and IHEs are starting to bring this model into the…

In the frame of a laboratory training course for medicine students, a new approach for laboratory exercises has been applied to teach the phenomena of circulation. The exercise program included measurements of radial artery blood flow waveform for different age groups using a noninvasive optical sensor. Arterial wave reflection was identified by…

This laboratory exercise demonstrates fundamental principles of mammalian locomotion. It provides opportunities to interrogate aspects of locomotion from biomechanics to energetics to body size scaling. It has the added benefit of having results with robust signal to noise so that students will have success even if not "meticulous" in…

This study classified students into different cognitive load (CL) groups by means of cluster analysis based on their experienced CL in a gene technology outreach lab which has instructionally been designed with regard to CL theory. The relationships of the identified student CL clusters to learner characteristics, laboratory variables, and…

Static friction is an important concept in introductory physics. Later in the year students apply their understanding of static friction under more complex conditions of static equilibrium. Traditional lab demonstrations in this case involve exceeding of the maximum level of static friction, resulting in the "onset of motion." (Contains…

This paper describes the construction of a simple inexpensive scanner which can be used in conjunction with a data logger to produce intensity plots of diffraction and interference patterns. Making use of the drive mechanism from an old inkjet-printer is the central feature. (Contains 7 figures.)

We discuss how compressed images created by modern digital cameras can lead to even severe problems in the quantitative analysis of experiments based on such images. Difficulties result from the nonlinear treatment of lighting intensity values stored in compressed files. To overcome such troubles, one has to adopt noncompressed, native formats, as…

This dissertation addresses different methods and challenges surrounding characterizing and identifying minerals in three environments: in the classroom, in soils, and in talc deposits. A lab manual for a mineralogy and optical mineralogy course prepares students for mineral characterization and identification by giving them the methods and tools…

Cervical cancer is the second most frequent cancer in women around the world and affects half a million women per year. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 275,000 women die every year, and 80% to 85% of these deaths occur in low-resource countries in Africa and South America. In Peru, cervical cancer has the highest incidence and…

A low-cost, straightforward, rapid prototyping of whole-glass microfluidic devices is presented using glass-etching cream that can be easily purchased in local stores. A self-adhered vinyl stencil cut out by a desktop digital craft cutter was used as an etching mask for patterning microstructures in glass using the glass-etching cream. A specific…

In this discovery-oriented laboratory experiment, students use solid-phase synthesis techniques to construct a dipeptide containing an unknown amino acid. Following synthesis and cleavage from the polymeric support, electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry is employed to identify the unknown amino acid that was used in the peptide coupling. This…

A laboratory experiment based on the titration of boric acid with strong base in the presence of d-mannitol is described. Boric acid is a very weak acid and direct titration with NaOH is not possible. An auxiliary reagent that contributes to the release of protons in a known stoichiometry facilitates the acid-base titration. Students obtain the…

A microfluidics-based laboratory experiment for the analysis of DNA fragments in an analytical undergraduate course is presented. The experiment is set within the context of food species identification via amplified DNA fragments. The students are provided with berry samples from which they extract DNA and perform polymerase chain reaction (PCR)…