“Probably what you should learn if you are a graduate student is not a large number of facts, especially if they are in books, but what the important problems are, and to sense which experiments, work that has been done, probably aren’t quite right.” James Watson

Course outline: Basic information skills for biomedical research

Introduction

This page describes the course outline and provides links to the lecture slides for each segment (click on the title hyperlink) and to details of the practical activities and related supplementary material (right-hand sidebar)

In order to complete the course, you will need a good Web connection, preferbly broadband. Many resources will be accessible from home, but some will only be available via the University network.

Segment 1. Lecture: Introduction to the course. (Duration 1 hour)

Topics covered:

Segment 1. Practical: Activity 1 (Duration 2 hours)

Send the course leader an email listing the top 5 journals in your research area plus the title of your project. Do some background reading for some of the practical tasks.

Segment 2. Lecture: The virtual library. (Duration 2 hours)

Topics covered:

Segment 2. Practical: Activity 2 (Duration 6 hours)

Read through tutorials for Google, PubMed, Scopus, (or Web of Science), ScienceDirect and then answer the questions. We will discuss the results a the beginning of the next session

Segment 3. Lecture: Using the virtual library. (Duration 2 hours)

Topics covered:

Segment 3. Practical: Activity 3 (Duration 2 hours)

Choose a small set of keywords that is effective at finding new articles of relevance to your research problem. Use these keywords to identify and explain some of the differences between different resources. How would you build new Web resources to support your research ?

Segment 4. Lecture: Other types of database and browser (Duration 2 hours)

Topics covered:

Segment 4. Practical:Activity 4 (Duration 3 hours)

This exercise is in two parts. Choose one of the mini-courses at NCBI. Carry out the activities and prepare notes to report your experiences back to the group. Pick two databases that are used regularly in your field. Describe their features to the group at the next session.

Segment 5. Lecture:Developing testable hypotheses (Duration 1 hour)

Topics covered:

Segment 5. Practical: Activity 5 (Duration 3 hours)

Use a recent review article to select an important problem in an area that is different to your chosen field of study. Find out what progress has been made subsequently to solve this problem. What new problems or issues have been identified as a result ? Make a 3-slide presentation describing this progress to the group at the next session.

Segment 6. Lecture: Framing and presenting your problem (Duration 2 hours):

Topics covered:

Segment 6. Practical: Activity 6 (Duration 6 hours)

Identify the five most important articles that frame your hypothesis, i.e. the assumptions on which your idea is based. What alternative experimental approaches are available to answer your question? How do you intend to verify your hypothesis? Identify and justify the journal you want to publish the results of your research in. Give a 3-slide presentation to justify your choices at the next session.

Take a refresher course in statistics.

Learn more about presentation skills.

Segment 7. Lecture: Writing a scientific article (Duration 2 hours)

Topics covered:

Segment 7. Practical:Activity 7 (Duration 5 hours)

This exercise is in four parts. Read the article about the ivory-billed woodpecker and answer the questions. Reconstruct published abstracts from a series of single sentences. Identify where critical references should be placed in a given text passage. Identify and discuss an example of one good and one bad figure/table/caption. Discuss your answers at the next session

Segment 8. Lecture:Getting a scientific article published (Duration 2 hours)

Topics covered:

Segment 8. Practical:Activity 8 (Duration 3 hours)

Using the guidelines provided, act as a group to assess the clarity of the research project proposals. Each student to review and discuss feedback for their own manuscripts. Prepare to discuss your findings at the next session.

Segment 9. Research assessment (Duration 2 hours)

Topics covered:

Segment 9. Practical. Activity 9 (Duration 3 hours)

Obtain Impact Factors for your top 5 journals and add them to your Excel spreadsheet. Read articles on scientific failure and prepare to comment on them for the last session

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