Anomalous secondary growth - last lab with this fabulous demo of examples from local lianas in Brazil

Is there a way to do this with less effort, while maintaining a meaningful research experience? We are very happy with our effort but would love to hear from others on what they tried. As courses reorganize & move towards more CURE labs, the effort needed has to be acknowledged.

This CURE requires 1 lecture from a PI, hours of pre-preparation from 2 senior lab personnel, presence of these 2 experts for three 3-hour labs for 4 sections & then extensive help with data analysis, & final report grading. Course instructor & TAs are backup & present throughout

They spend huge amounts of time vibratome sectioning and staining roots. Slides are made & organized for the class. >100 UGs spend three 3-hour lab classes to collect data, get trained in data analyses, and how to report the data. A final report is submitted & graded.

Conchi and Kevin are interested in specification of cell walls in an outer cortical exodermal layer. Their materials have to be analyzed within the confines of the UG expertise and equipment available for our course (no fluorescent microscopes, or microscope cameras).

We need unanswered questions that students can answer. My notes on collaborative effort in my upper division class with heavy lifting from @CManzanoF, Kevin Morimoto and @Bradylabs. After the root lectures @Bradlabs lectures on the importance of the questions posed in the CURE

I know many are invested in providing quality research experiences to UGs via Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CURE). Our effort at UC Davis in Plant Biology had to start with a question, within confines of the materials for the Developmental Plant Anatomy course.

That is just one side each of two allowed cards! And six lectures worth of material.

Students are allowed two notecards for exams - look at this one

Flowers, inflorescences, and fruits in Developmental Plant Anatomy!

Moving my thoughts on Plants and Development and Evolution here!