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Relevance. 

Disorders of the nervous system comprise the majority of health-related disorders, exceeding the burden imposed by cancer and heart diseases combined, yet many neural disorders lack treatments or an understanding of causative mechanisms. President Obama launched the Brain Initiative in April 2013, heralding a massive cross agency/industry campaign to direct biomedical research toward greater understanding of brain science from molecules to behavior. Funding and employment in neuroscience-related areas are predicted to increase dramatically over the next decades.

 

URL:    https://www.whitehouse.gov/share/brain-initiative

Outcomes.

  • Students who complete the course will be able to explain the fundamentals of the prevalence and causes of selected neural disorders, and will be able demonstrate how their discipline is contributing to research in brain science.

  • Students will have undertaken a skills assessment, and will have identified potential laboratories/work settings where they can potentially engage in neuroscience research after completion of their NMSU degree. 

  • A capstone research analysis portfolio will showcase the student course learning experience.

 

Required materials

  • Textbook:  Neurobiology of Brain Disorders, Zigmond et al. (2015)

  • In class laptop computer or tablet connected to NMSU AggieAir.

 

 

Content.

 

Disorders of the Nervous System is a 2 credit seminar for graduate students who are curious about the brain and nervous system and who are interested in learning  how their graduate degrees can prepare them for careers in neuroscience-related areas. 

 

The course will introduce students to current state of research on the causes and treatments for prominent neural disorders such as Alzheimer’s, autism, Parkinson’s, traumatic brain injury, schizophrenia, and epilepsy. 

 

The class format emphasizes interdisciplinary approaches, hands-on interactive class activities and discussion, targeted readings from the primary and secondary literature, and minimizes lectures. 

 

Prerequisites.

The course is designed to enable participation from relevant STEM graduate student majors (e.g. engineering, psychology, genetics, computational sciences, cell biology, behavior). Undergraduate seniors with a background in neurobiology and psychology are elgible to enroll.

 

 

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