Weekly Schedule

General Advice

The summer Bio 260 course is divided into 12 weeks with topics recommended for each week. The summer course has been designed to match the regular semester course taught by Dr. Carter as closely as possible.

The labs are synchronized and your lab instructor will provide you with the information for the procedures and activities in the lab. This page is for the lecture portion of the course.

The lecture videos are posted on YouTube for your convenience.

Feel free to subscribe to the Pleiotropy YouTube channel if you want automated updates when updated videos are posted and to have lasting access to these videos (i.e., after the semester ends and you lose access to Canvas). There is a playlist on that channel for this course.

Accompanying most videos is a single PDF of the video slides. This is delibarately not a large size set of slides in order to encourage you to take your own notes instead of just printing out copies of the slides. Having your own notes will be easier to study from and review before the exam. Also, the physical act of writing and organizing your own notes improves understanding and retention over purely passive listening.

The weekly assignments are posted here. Be sure to do the one that corresponds to your information (e.g., last name, ID number). You will not upload documents, the assignment will be submitted using the "quiz" function in Canvas. Start the quiz and you will have plenty of time to enter the answers and values asked for in the assignment. Exams will use the same quiz function, but with a set length of two hours allowed.

Shortly after the due date for each assignment, the keys will be posted so you can check your answers. Since there are multiple forms, if you find that you didn't get the right answers, you can use the alternate form to try again. You can't submit this second assignment for credit, but you can use it to make sure you get the correct answers in preparation for exams which have very similar questions.

Practice assignment

Throughout the semester you will be submitting assignments using the "Quiz" function in Canvas. This is also how you will take lecture exams. To allow you to familiarize yourself with the way this works, there is a practice assignment due by the end of the first Friday (the usual weekly deadline). The assignment does not count for credit, but I highly recommend doing it.

For this assignment I have posted two versions and you can do whichever one you want. There are usually multiple versions for each week and you must do the one that applies to you. If you complete the wrong assignment, or submit answers to the questions on your assignment to the wrong quiz, you are not guaranteed credit (i.e, you may get a zero).

Practice assignment:
  • If you prefer chocolate over vanilla: Form A - KEY
  • If you prefer vanilla over chocolate: Form B - KEY

Week 1: May 28 - June 2

This week introduces the basic concepts in statistics, the approach whereby we take a sample from a population to estimate properties of that population. We also introduce the summation notation used for describing summations and other calculations when we have a table of data values.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #1: Summation Notation
  • Lab #2: Using Excel for Calculations and Statistics
  • Lab #4: Measurement Accuracy and Precision in Biology

Lecture assignment for this week is based on the first letter of your LAST name:

Assignment #1 due by 10:00 PM on June 2

Week 2: June 3 - June 9

This week covers the basic statistics and calculations used to describe sets of data values. Typically we are calculating summary statistics from our sample in an effort to summarize the data and estimate the parameters of the population. In general, we are interested in values that summarize the location, spread, and shape of the distribution of data values.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #3: Using R for Calculations and Statistics
  • Lab #5: Descriptive Statistics

Lecture assignment for this week is based on the first letter of your FIRST name:

Assignment #2 due by 10:00 PM on June 9

Week 3: June 10 - June 16

This week we introduce the foundational rules of probability. The basic concepts and rules of probability are useful for understanding the role of chance in our studies and because they will be the base upon which we build probability distributions that are used in statistical tests.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #6: Probability and Random Sampling

Lecture assignment for this week is based on whether the last digit of your student ID is even (includes zero) or odd (excludes zero):

Assignment #3 due by 10:00 PM on June 16

Week 4: June 17 - June 23

This week examines two important probability distributions. The binomial probability distribution is the first and most simple probability distribution we will learn. It is the base for the other ones we will examine. The Poisson distribution is derived from the binomial distribution and models the situation in which we have a very large number of trials, but the success probability for each trial is low. This distribution is used in situations in which we try to figure out if our observations are random or there is a pattern.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week canceled due to Juneteenth falling on one of the lab days.
  • No labs this week.

Lecture assignment for this week is based on whether the first letter of your LAST name is a consonant or a vowel:

Assignment #4 due by 10:00 PM on June 23

LECTURE EXAM #1 is on JUNE 24

Week 5: June 24 - June 30

This week examines two related topics, the normal distribution and confidence intervals. The normal distribution is also derived from the binomial distribution and models the situation in which we have a very large number of trials, but the success probability for each trial is not necessarily low. The normal distribution, and a similar distribution called the t-distribution, are the ones we will use to estimate the likely values of population means based on samples taken from them. These Confidence intervals for the population mean use the t-distribution (very similar to the normal distribution) to estimate regions within which the population mean is likely to be.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #7: Binomial Probability Distribution
  • Lab #8: Poisson Probability Distribution

Lecture assignment for this week is based on the first letter of your LAST name:

Assignment #5 due by 10:00 PM on June 30

Week 6: July 1 - July 7

This week introduces our first statistical test, the one sample t test. In this test we make a hypothesis about the value of the the population mean and then reject or fail to reject this hypothesis by looking at the width of the confidence intervals around the sample mean. We extend this concept to develop the two sample t-test which allows us to compare the means of two samples to determine whether the means of the populations they come from are likely to be different or not. This is a super useful test widely used (unlike the one-sample t-test). There are actually several different t-tests and one of them requires equal variances in the populations. We therefore also look at the variance ratio F test which is a test that allows us to compare the variances of two samples to determine whether the variances of the populations they come from are likely to be different or not. The last video goes into more detail about the types of statistical errors we can make when interpreting the results of our statistical test.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #9: Normal Probability Distribution and Z‐scores
  • Lab #10: Confidence Intervals for Population Frequencies and Means

Lecture assignment for this week is based on whether the last digit of your student ID is even or odd:

Assignment #6 due by 10:00 PM on July 7

Week 7: July 8 - July 14

This week covers a pair of topics related to good scientific practice. First, we look at calculations used in the design or anaylysis phases of studies. These are ones to determine the power of completed studies and the required sample sizes for planned studies yet to begin. Secondly, we look at understanding the risk of false positives and negatives and how this relates to the rarity of the condition being tested for.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #11: The One‐Sample t Test of a Single Mean
  • Lab #12: F Test for Equality of two Variances
  • Lab #13: Two Sample Tests for Comparing Two Means

Lecture assignment for this week is based on whether the first letter of your LAST name is a consonant or a vowel:

Assignment #7 due by 10:00 PM on July 14

Week 8: July 15 - July 21

This week covers a pair of topics related to good scientific practice. The first videos look at biases that can cause problems and things to consider when designing experiments. They also discuss two famous experiments that serve as ethical cautions for performing scientific studies. The second set of videos look at how best to visually display data.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #14: Chi-squared Analyses of Frequencies Week 7 lab assessment
  • Lab #15: The Odds Ratio

There is no lecture assignment for this week in order to give you more time to focus on the exams scheduled next week.

LECTURE EXAM #2 is on JULY 22

Week 9: July 22 - July 28

This week introduces the chi-squared techniques for comparing frequencies in different categories. Related techniques covered include calculation of the relative risk, odds ratio, and risk difference.

Video lectures this week

Lab exam this week.

Lecture assignment for this week is based on whether the first letter of your FIRST name:

Assignment #8 due by 10:00 PM on July 28

Week 10: July 29 - August 4

This week introduces the one-factor ANOVA, a method to compare the means in more than two populations. This week also introduces the two-factor ANOVA, a method to identify relationships between two factors and the means of groups that differ in those factors. It can also be used to detect interactions between the factors. The Fmax test is a pre-requisite for these techniques.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #16: Variance tests & Data Transformations
  • Lab #17: ANOVA ‐ One‐Factor Analysis of Variance

Lecture assignment for this week is based on the first letter of your LAST name:

Assignment #9 due by 10:00 PM on August 4

Week 11: August 5 - August 11

This week describes the correlation and regression methods to look for relationships between two variables.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week (your TA will provide information about activities and the assessment):
  • Lab #18: ANOVA ‐ Two‐Factor Analysis of Variance

Lecture assignment for this week is based on whether the last digit of your student ID is even or odd:

Assignment #10 due by 10:00 PM on August 11

Week 12: August 12 - August 16

This week covers the last few topics for the course: how to read a scientific paper, designing metrics, and a tour of advanced statistics.

Video lectures this week

Labs this week:
  • Lab #19: Regression and Correlation

LECTURE EXAM #3 is on AUGUST 16