EdX

Biochemistry: Biomolecules, Methods, and Mechanisms (edX)

Offered by MIT, MITx,
Biochemistry: Biomolecules, Methods, and Mechanisms (edX)

Enhance your scientific thinking and data analysis skills with this in-depth adventure through biochemistry. Do you want to prepare for medical school, study a STEM field, become a research scientist, or transition to a career in the booming biotechnology industry? Or maybe you just want to understand the chemical reactions that govern life itself.

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Join Professor Yaffe, an MIT professor and practicing surgeon, as he guides you through the science that inspires countless doctors, researchers, and students alike.
We developed 7.05x Biochemistry with an emphasis on:

  • Developing your scientific thinking skills including articulating hypotheses, performing thought experiments, interpreting data, and designing experiments.
  • Using data based on real scientific experiments and highlighting the scientific process.
  • Asserting that biology is an active field that changes daily through examples of MIT (and other current) research, not static information in a textbook.
  • Visualizing real molecular structures with PyMOL to better understand function and mechanism.
  • Appreciating the quantitative aspects of biochemistry and practicing this quantitation with MATLAB.
  • Translating topics in biochemistry to diseases and medicine.
  • Conveying the authentic MIT firehose experience.
  • Implementing the science of learning in the course design.

What you'll learn

  • How to apply the scientific method to pursue research questions.
  • How to analyze protein purification schemes.
  • How scientists determine the structure of a protein.
  • How structure, allostery, and the Bohr effect influence hemoglobin function.
  • How to interpret graphs, plot behaviors, and calculate constants related to enzyme function.
  • How pumps, transporters, and channels differ to regulate molecule transfer across membranes.
  • How G proteins play a key role in signaling.

Syllabus

The course includes the following learning sequences:

  • Introduction to Biochemistry; pH and Buffers
  • Amino Acids and Proteins
  • Protein Purification
  • Protein Structure
  • Protein Folding
  • Hemoglobin and Allostery
  • Hemoglobin and the Bohr Effect
  • Enzyme Chemistry
  • Enzyme as Catalysts
  • Enzyme Kinetics
  • Membranes, Channels, Transporters, and Pumps
  • Blood Clotting
  • Signal Transduction

Prerequisites:

  • Undergraduate introductory biology (biochemistry and molecular biology);
  • Undergraduate introductory chemistry;
  • Undergraduate organic chemistry I (chemical structures and biological mechanisms)
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