Semester:
Offered:
Sien Verschave (Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology) and
Daniel Kahne (Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology)
First-Year Seminar 52T 4 credits (spring term)
Prerequisites: Student must have had fall term enrollment in LS1A, LPSA, or LS50.
Science courses are typically structured to teach core concepts about the physical world and the living systems in it. The concepts taught result from decades of scientific research. Research is a process of inquiry that seeks knowledge about important problems that are not understood. Experiencing the intellectual excitement and challenges of performing research can support your long-term career goals regardless of what those are, but how does someone go about creating new knowledge through research?
Lab courses teach the mechanics of performing specific techniques, keeping a notebook, and interpreting data, yet they rarely address how new knowledge is generated. How does a scientist know what questions to ask? What makes a question worth spending time and resources on? How do scientists come up with strategies to address these impactful questions? All scientists start by critically evaluating a field, but what does that mean? How do you read a scientific article and analyze their methods and conclusions? How can primary literature effectively help frame the questions in need of answers? This seminar guides students into the world of scientific research and prepares them for a real-world research experience. Through different assignments students learn how scientists think and perform science, while developing critical thinking and reading skills that are especially useful in research. In addition, students get the opportunity to interact with several scientists about their research. Students who successfully complete the seminar will be offered the opportunity to participate in a summer research project overseen by a group of Harvard faculty.