Literature Seminar Series with Andreas Brachmann

Seminar concept

This literature seminar series covers different topics, but always has the same three goals:

1. introduce and discuss important factual information relevant for all biologists (not only molecular biologists);
2. give experience in critical reading of scientific articles, also making familiar with commonly used molecular biological techniques;
3. offer the opportunity to improve presentation as well as discussion and feedback skills in English.

Schedule

Seminar structure

In order to achieve the before-menioned three goals each "normal" seminar day has a specific two-part structure:
1. Introduction into the seminar day's topic
The speaker of the day does not introduce the publication of the seminar day but rather the general topic. For this, the speaker familiarizes her/himself with the topic and asks her/himself the important questions: "What is interesting about this?" "What could I present that will help and interest my fellow participants?" From the (very individual) answers to these questions the speaker compiles a list of "Take-Home-Messages" (ca. 2-4) which she/he hands in at least 2 weeks before the seminar day for review. At least 1 week before the seminar date the speaker hands in the final presentation (max. 12 min) for feedback on content and design. Remember: the presentation should benefit all members of the group! An excellent introduction into good scientific presentation can be found on the webpage "How To Give a Talk" by David L. Stern.
After this presentation there is time for questions and also evaluation and feedback on the performance. For this, we use the Genetics seminar talk evaluation sheet.
2. The original publication
All participants have read the publication of the day and prepared their list of questions on the paper. The speaker has prepared a PowerPoint presentation containing all the figures and tables (including supplementary data) in locigal order and in sufficient quality. Using this presentation all participants explain the publication to one participant that hasn't read the publication.

In addition to 10 "normal" seminar days there are 2 "special" seminar days (at the beginning of the semester) dealing with how to read a scientific article, how to make a good presentation, or with science, scientific progress and scientific publishing in general.

Workload

The total workload of each seminar is 3 ECTS points equalling 90 work hours. This workload contains the following individual tasks:

Grading

The Genetics talk grading sheet will be used for grading. This grade can be modified by adherence to deadlines and activity in the presentation preparation process, and by participation in the seminar discussions. Each of these can lead to a modification of the grade by 0.3 up or down according to quality (poor/excellent).

Contact

Please note that study-related information will only be sent to CampusLMU email addresses, because this is the only way your identity can be verified. For this reason, please always send your requests from your CampusLMU address.