BECAUSE IN THE FUTURE YOUR BRAIN MAY RUN ON BOTH A CHIP AND NEURONS
Life Sciences
SignatureProjects
The Life Sciences major will offer the opportunity to work on exciting projects such as
Understand the structure and function of DNA and RNA; the molecules that carry the information necessary to create all known life.
Conceptualize and perform experiments to amplify specific pieces of DNA to infer the characteristic of organisms, with potential applications to disease diagnostics. You can learn how to infer Rh-factor analysis, paternity testing and also appreciate innumerable applications of this revolutionary technique.
Understand the properties of the building blocks of matter. Use this knowledge to conceptualise how atoms arrange themselves in a three dimensional manner to create the complex forms of life. You will be pondering upon the diversified atomic structures that lead to various cell/tissue types and their respective structural integrity.
Learn the fundamentals of altering small sequences of DNA using bacterial enzymes. Attach target sequences to the plasmid using restriction endonucleases. These applications are in use to make vaccines, antibodies, genetically modified organisms, to improve crop life barring the use of chemical pesticides etc.
Explore the journey of a single cell as it evolves from evolution of multicellular life forms from single cells, uncover principles of cellular organisation and communication.
Explore the principles of how connected systems survive and sustain themselves, from the level of organisms to societies to entire ecosystems and in turn take up this inspiration of the past to build a sustainable present and ultimately, future.
Explore the different methods available to modern scientists to visualise structural details inside cells and tissues. Learn the fundamentals of tissue preservation and sectioning for microscopy. Begin by learning the fundamentals of visible light optical microscopic systems, as well as how to process samples and acquire images independently. Continue to explore microscopy via exposure to fluorescence microscopy and optical contrast methods such as phase and differential interference contrast. Get hands on exposure to thin sectioning of paraffin embedded tissue using microtomes.
Fundamental understanding of the genetic and molecular organisation of the micro-cosmos around us and the subsequent analogies with the eukaryotic system will provide insights towards a deeper learning of their behavioural pattern. As a part of the project, you will also learn how to grow microorganisms in the laboratory from different environmental samples around us, observe them macro- and microscopically, and analyse their characteristics.
Use of bioinformatics tools to visualise and compare the phylogenetic relationships based on DNA sequences. Compare the specific sequence signature patterns in the DNA sequence through analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), promoter prediction, restriction site predicition etc.
Learn how to build modern data acquisition systems and use them to acquire time-series data from the environment, providing a deeper understanding of biological systems. Explore and implement modern data analysis techniques based on self-acquired data using different statistical tools to gain a better insight from the collected data into the various aspects.
Use bioinformatic and computational tools to analyse the DNA and protein sequences of pathogens to predict the effect of mutations on protein structure and function. Use tools like PyMOL to visualise protein structures and also perform energy minimisation with tools like CHARMM.
Using antibody-antigen interaction via ELISA or similar immunoassays, PCR based detection and Western Blotting, characterise the immunogen. As well as find out the activation of specific cytokines and factors/marker proteins associated with innate or adaptive immune responses.
Explore the techniques of plant protein extraction and visualisation using Polyacrylamide Gel Electrophoresis, compare protein samples from different plant parts by both quantitatively and qualitatively.
Analysis of secondary metabolites including phenols, flavonoids, alkaloids, antioxidants and defence enzymes from different parts of plants to understand the plant metabolism and physiology under various biotic and abiotic stress conditions.
Investigation of bacterial and fungal endophytes and their role in plant metabolism and protection.
Use various algorithmic techniques and data structures to understand biological systems and simultaneously optimise research methodology for big data analysis and complex data models in life sciences and applied fields.