Fall 2024

An examination of the physical and biological laws that influence agriculture, pollution, population dynamics (including humans), climate, biodiversity and ecosystem structure and function. Not available for major credit.

The human organism; the nature of inherited and acquired diseases;the biological and societal basis for the AIDS epidemic; therapy,drug design and the future. Not available for major credit.

Exploration of the unique properties of brain cells that allow complex perceptions and behaviors; examination of structure and activity of brain cells that underlie function.

Scientific principles underlying forensic approaches to the investigation of crimes and its societal impact on law, culture and media. Not available for major credit.

Exploration of factors that influence climate and the scientific basis for concern about rising greenhouse gases, the threat to human society know as global warming.

Causes of earthquakes and nature of large faults; earthquake hazard and risk; world's great earthquakes; understanding the Richter scale. Lecture, 3 hours; laboratory, 2 hours; one fieldtrip required.

Foundations of the human species. Examination of scientific evidence from Darwinian theory, primate behavior, fossils, and the behavior of modern people. Laboratory. Duplicates credit in former ANTH 200Lg.

The physiological and nutritional basis of human performance. Factors that facilitate and limit athletic achievement. Lecture, 3 hours; laboratory, 2 hours. Not available for major credit. Duplicates credit in former EXSC 205Lxg.

Words as tools for discovering properties of the human mind. How words are formed of and form various units. Experiments exploring judgments about word interpretation.

Study of human linguistic competence and technologies that simulate it. Phonetics, vibration and signal processing, speech recognition, neural networks.

Investigation of energy technologies, including development and implementation issues. Topics include the Industrial Revolution, electromagnetic induction, power transmission, combustion engines, fission and fusion. Not available for major credit.

An exploration of earth's water, ranging from water properties, chemistry, and pollution, to groundwater dynamics, watershed processes, and oceanic-atmospheric circulation. Implications for past and future societies. Lecture and laboratory.