Two NDSU Department of Veterinary and Microbiological Sciences faculty are members of a group to receive a grant from the Association of Public Land-Grant Universities for an innovative teaching plan that uses cutting-edge technology.
Teresa Bergholz, assistant professor, and instructor Janice Haggart received the $2,000 grant for a project called “Implementing inquiry-driven assessments of microbial diversity in undergraduate laboratory courses.” Bergholz and Haggart join colleagues Shana Petermann and Emily Lutgen of Minnesota State Community and Technical College in receiving the funding. The grant is being matched by NDSU.
According to the proposal, complex groups of diverse microbes can be found nearly everywhere in the world. Until recently, scientists have only been able to evaluate a small portion of the microbes with culture-based techniques. New DNA sequencing technologies have opened many research and learning opportunities.
Through the teaching project, students at both NDSU and MSCTC will participate in a learning module where they isolate bacterial DNA, explore primer design and selection and prepare samples for sequencing. Students will conduct an assessment of the microbiome in a complex sample before and after manipulation of that sample’s environment. Students will be challenged to generate a hypothesis about the microbes in the sample and how the diversity may change when the sample is placed under different conditions.
The experience will begin with 10 students at each location in spring 2015, followed by about 25 students at each school the following spring.
NDSU is recognized as one of the nation's top 108 public and private universities by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education.
