SBD Course Offerings

The SBD semester is organized as a series of 4 three-week modules; students chose a single course in each module.  These courses are inspired by the MBL’s world-renown summer Advanced Research Training Courses and are an intense immersion focusing on experiential learning through laboratory research. Students can earn a full semester or quarters worth of credit for participation in SBD.

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2027 Course Schedule now updated!

Parasitology: Kate Rawlinson

This course introduces the diversity of parasitic Protozoa and Metazoa, and explores the morphology, genomics, developmental life cycle, pathology, immunology, epidemiology, and treatment and control of the major parasite groups. The focus will be on aquatic species, including those that cause pathology in humans and other mammals. The course will involve lectures, fieldwork and lab experiments including designing and carrying out an independent research project.

Imaging for Biological Research: Louis Kerr and Carsten Wolff

This course will introduce students to the fundamentals of imaging, quickly advancing to cutting edge advances in the field.  The course will focus on use state-of-the art microscopes, with students designing and executing an original research project including data acquisition and analysis using cutting-edge image analysis software.

Microbes Across Environments: David Mark Welch

Microbes Across Environments provides a comprehensive introduction to microbiome research, tools and approaches for investigation, and a lexicon for biological understanding of the role of microbial communities in environmental and host environments. Microbiome science is an emerging field that bridges disciplines, merging microbiology with genomics, ecosystem science, computation, biogeochemistry, modeling, medicine, surgery, immunology, molecular engineering, and many others, including architecture, social science, chemistry and even economics. In this course we will uncover the vast biochemical and metabolic diversity of the microbial world by examining microbial communities and microbiomes from ocean and marine ecosystems in free-living and host-associated contexts. Students will develop or strengthen biological field and lab techniques, analyze and compare data prepared from student-collected samples, and integrate fundamental knowledge, modeling, and theory of microbiome research.

Embryology: A star is born: reproduction and embryology in sea stars and other marine invertebrates: Zak Swartz

How do animals make eggs, and how to eggs make animals? How will a changing climate affect these processes? In this course, students will learn fundamental concepts in animal reproduction and embryonic development across a range of species, from a biomedical, evolutionary, and climate change perspective. We will explore classic results and recent discoveries through lectures and discussion of research papers. In the laboratory, students will learn cell biological and embryological techniques including gamete and embryo culture, microinjection and live imaging, primarily with the bat star Patiria miniata. Students will conduct independent embryology projects focusing on marine invertebrate reproduction and embryogenesis.

Neurobiology and Behavior of Marine Organisms: Jennifer Morgan and Margherita Perillo 

Marine organisms have played an instrumental role in defining how the nervous system works and the underlying neural mechanisms that drive animal behavior. This course will showcase how marine models such as lampreys, cephalopods, and echinoderms, have been used for seminal work in neurobiology and how they are being used today for novel, cutting-edge research. Coursework topics include: neuronal excitability, synapses, circuits, neurodevelopment, regeneration, evolution, and behavior. In addition to lectures and discussions of key literature, this course features hands-on laboratory-based exercises using imaging, physiology, and behavioral assays, as well as independent "discovery" projects to explore new research avenues. Projects and techniques learned in this course will synergistically complement neurobiology courses that focus on traditional animal systems.

Neurogenetics: Genetic Information in the Brains of Cephalopods: Joshua Rosenthal

The coleoid cephalopods (squids, octopuses and cuttlefishes) display the most complex behaviors of all invertebrates. The number of neurons in their nervous systems, and the behaviors they are used to control, are comparable to those of mammals, despite the half billion years of independent evolution. To help us understand the cephalopod brain, there’s no better place to start than with its blueprint within the genome and how this information is encoded. This course focuses on genetic information. It will explore the novel gene families within the recently sequenced cephalopod genomes and then cover how the information from these genes can be systematically edited as it passes through messenger RNA, often in a manner that is dependent on the external environment. Finally, we will examine how these genetic novelties result in proteins that operate in different ways. Lab exercises will range from tracking RNA editing enzymes within cells using immunostaining and advanced microscopy, examining mRNA editing patterns across neuronal tissues using PCR and DNA sequencing, and testing the functional effects of RNA editing on ion channels using electrophysiological recordings. Students will conduct independent projects in these areas during the final week of the course. Cephalopod neurogenetics is in its infancy, giving students access to an area of current, novel discovery.

Biodiversity: Exploring the Marine Diversity of Woods Hole Using Molecular Tools: Andrew Gillis

This course presents an overview of the diversity of living organisms, including archaea, bacteria, single-celled eukaryotes, fungi, plants, and animals, with an emphasis on their evolutionary histories, relationships, and the biological and evolutionary implications of the characteristic features of each group. We will explore how these different lineages have evolved remarkable solutions to challenges in locomotion, metabolism, and life in extreme environments.

Dynamic Camouflage: Behavior, Visual Perception and Neural Skin Patterning in Cephalopods: Roger Hanlon

This course takes an integrative approach to understanding a neurally controlled system of dynamic defense against visual predators. Camouflage is a widespread form of defense throughout the animal kingdom in every known habitat - land or sea. In the oceans, cephalopods (cuttlefish, octopus, squid) have evolved a sophisticated sensorimotor system called Rapid Adaptive Coloration, which can instantaneously change their total body appearance within a fraction of a second to range from highly camouflaged to startlingly conspicuous for a wide range of behaviors.  Due to the nature of the course only a limited number of students can take it. 

Weekly Seminars:

Science Writing

Three decades ago, Carl Sagan wrote, “We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.” This sentence still rings true today. There are many factors you could blame: the education system, social media, misinformation, the TV news cycle, or increasingly siloed scientific fields. In reality, all of these factors play a role. Here’s another to add to the list: scientists are trained to explain their work to other scientists, but not to the public at large.

Simultaneously, most members of the public do not have the training to read and understand scientific research. Yet that does not mean the public lacks an interest in science. According to Pew Research polls, the majority of Americans are interested in learning about science, health, and technology. If scientists want to help this interested public look past misinformation, trust in research, and vote for science-based solutions, there’s one major thing they can do: learn how to communicate their science clearly and concisely, without the specialized jargon often found in scientists’ writing.

That’s what you’re here to learn. No matter what path you choose to follow professionally, you will leave the course with the skills to construct simple and compelling stories from complex scientific ideas, and to convey accuracy without sacrificing clarity.