Relevant material from MIT's introductory courses to support students as they study and educators as they teach the AP Biology curriculum.

In Chiapas, one of the poorest states in Mexico, an estimated 150,000 children are malnourished. To end this problem, governments have implemented food security policies, including food importation and industrial food production. In 2008 alone, Mexico imported 20 million tons of food. While these policies certainly help to remedy the problem in the short term, the massive importation of basic foodstuffs and incentives to industrial agriculture may widen social inequality, threaten health and deteriorate biodiversity and ecosystem services. I will present the objectives and achievements of initiatives born in the highlands of Chiapas to enhance local food production free of hazardous pesticides and appropriate to the culture of the region. Examples include the rescue of local knowledge for food production, a school gardens program and the Network of Producers and Consumers for Healthy Local Food.

A comprehensive treatment of the advanced methods of applied mathematics. Designed to strengthen the mathematical abilities of graduate students and train them to think on their own. Review of elementary methods in complex analysis, ordinary differential equations, and partial differential equations. Expansions around regular and irregular singular points; asymptotic evaluation of integrals, regular perturbations; WKB method; multiple scale method; boundary-layer techniques.

Site characterization and geotechnical aspects of the design and construction of foundation systems. Topics include site investigation (with emphasis on in situ testing), shallow (footings and raftings) and deep (piles and caissons) foundations, excavation support systems, groundwater control, slope stability, soil improvement (compaction, soil reinforcement, etc.), and construction monitoring.

Our human society consists of many intertwined Large Scale Socio-Technical Systems (LSSTS), such as infrastructures, industrial networks, the financial systems etc. Environmental pressures created by these systems on Earth’s carrying capacity are leading to exhaustion of natural resources, loss of habitats and biodiversity, and are causing a resource and climate crisis. To avoid this sustainability crisis, we urgently need to transform our production and consumption patterns. Given that we, as inhabitants of this planet, are part of a complex and integrated global system, where and how should we begin this transformation? And how can we also ensure that our transformation efforts will lead to a sustainable world?

LSSTS and the ecosystems that they are embedded in are known to be Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS). According to John Holland CAS are "...a dynamic network of many agents (which may represent cells, species, individuals, firms, nations) acting in parallel, constantly acting and reacting to what the other agents are doing. The control of a CAS tends to be highly dispersed and decentralized. If there is to be any coherent behavior in the system, it will have to to arise from competition and cooperation among the agents themselves. The overall behavior of the system is the result of a huge number of decisions made every moment" by many individual agents.

Understanding Complex Adaptive Systems requires tools that themselves are complex to create and understand. Shalizi defines Agent Based Modeling as "An agent is a persistent thing which has some state we find worth representing, and which interacts with other agents, mutually modifying each other’s states. The components of an agent-based model are a collection of agents and their states, the rules governing the interactions of the agents and the environment within which they live."

This course will explore the theory of CAS and their main properties. It will also teach you how to work with Agent Based Models in order to model and understand CAS.

Highlights of this course include: Major biological, chemical and physical components of the agricultural systems The scientific basis for understanding these systems and their management How has science influenced policies related to agriculture, food safety and environment in the United States? How have the policies evolved over time in the US? What has worked and what has not; what are the reasons and what are the consequences? Beyond science, what other factors influence policies? How do we link what we learn to ecological agriculture? How do we use what we learn for policy analysis?

Highlights of this course include: Major biological, chemical, and physical components of the agricultural systems The scientific basis for understanding these systems and their management How science has influenced policies related to agriculture, food safety, and the environment in the United States How the policies have evolved over time in the US What has worked and what has not; the reasons and the consequences What other factors influence policies beyond science How we link what we learn to ecological agriculture How we use what we learn for policy analysis

Explores the changing roles, ethical conflicts, and public perceptions of science and scientists in American society from World War II to the present. Studies specific historical episodes focusing on debates between scientists and the contextual factors influencing their opinions and decisions. Topics include the atomic bomb project, environmental controversies, the Challenger disaster, biomedical research, genetic engineering, (mis)use of human subjects, scientific misconduct and whistleblowing.

This is a laboratory course supplemented by lectures that focus on selected analytical facilities that are commonly used to determine the mineralogy, elemental abundance and isotopic ratios of Sr and Pb in rocks, soils, sediments and water.

This course will sample the broad diversity of animal behavior and the behavioral adaptation of animals to the environments in which they live. This will include discussion of both field observations and controlled laboratory experiments. Particular emphasis will be placed on the comparison of behavior within an evolutionary framework, animal cognition, and on the genetic, neural, and hormonal mechanisms underlying behavior.

Most of the major categories of adaptive behavior can be seen in all animals. This course begins with the evolution of behavior, the driver of nervous system evolution, reviewed using concepts developed in ethology, sociobiology, other comparative studies, and in studies of brain evolution. The roles of various types of plasticity are considered, as well as foraging and feeding, defensive and aggressive behavior, courtship and reproduction, migration and navigation, social activities and communication, with contributions of inherited patterns and cognitive abilities. Both field and laboratory based studies are reviewed; and finally, human behavior is considered within the context of primate studies.

Third undergraduate design studio. Introduces skills needed to build within a landscape establishing continuities between the built and natural world. Students learn to build appropriately through analysis of landscape and climate for a chosen site and conceptualize design decisions through drawings and models. Studio deposit required. Mandatory lottery.

This site provides an illustrated lecture from a geochemistry course offered by Dr. Scott Wood at the University of Idaho. Topics include a review of the structure and formation of the Earth's crust, atmosphere, and hydrological cycle, and the composition of the atmosphere. Additional topics covered are the concept of residence time, geological and biological sources of components in the atmosphere, acid-base theory, Henry's law and the solubility of gases in water, primary and secondary air pollution, acid rain and how to carry out calculations of the pH of solutions containing acids, among others. The lecture presentation may be downloaded as a PDF document or a PowerPoint presentation. Reading and homework assignments, with answers, are also provided.

This course provides an introduction to the physics and chemistry of the atmosphere, including experience with computer codes. It is intended for undergraduates and first year graduate students.

This course introduces impact craters of the Earth. There are now 170 identified impact craters on the Earth, and this number is growing, ever since the well known discovery of Meteor Crater in 1920s. Currently, multi/inter disciplinary research studies of impact structures are getting conducted in fields like mineralogy, petrology, environmental geology and marine biology. This course is offered during the Independent Activities Period (IAP), which is a special 4-week term at MIT that runs from the first week of January until the end of the month.

This course encourages and trains students to think outside the box when addressing water-related problems. Our interdisciplinary approach is designed, for example,to give the health professional an introduction to the engineering components involved in the provision of safe water and sanitation. While at the same time providing the engineer an ecological framework for understanding the place of water in health, it also gives a voice to the ways in which water is involved in social interactions, belief systems, and the economics of an interconnected and interdependent world.

This course will introduce the student to the major concepts of biotechnology. The student will discuss genetic engineering of plants and animals and the current major medical, environmental, and agricultural applications of each. There are also a variety of topics that this course will cover after ranging from nanobiotechnology to environmental biotechnology. Upon successful completion of this course, the student will be able to: identify and describe the fields of biotechnology; compare and contrast forward and reverse genetics and the way they influence biodiversity; compare and contrast systemic studies of the genome, transcriptome, and proteome; explain how genome projects are performed, and discuss the completion and the information processing in these projects; describe and explain the principles of existing gene therapies; design strategies that support genetic counseling; explain and analyze DNA fingerprints, and compare DNA fingerprints to non-DNA biometrics; describe and compare bioremediation technologies in air, water, and soil; design strategies for generating genetically modified organisms, and discuss ethical concerns; discuss emerging fields in biotechnology. (Biology 403)

In this course, you will learn the basics of plant biology. The student will begin with plant anatomy, learning the names and functions of all of the parts of a plant, then move on to plant physiology, where you will learn about photosynthesis, growth, and reproduction. Next, the student will study plant evolution according to the fossil record and examine the diversity of plant life in existence today and how that diversity impacts global ecology. Upon successful completion of this course, the student will be able to: identify and describe the functions of the different cells, tissues, and organs that make up a plant; describe the major life processes in plants (photosynthesis, respiration, transpiration, growth and development, and reproduction) at the tissue, organ, cellular, and molecular level; explain the history and evolution of plants on earth; discuss plant diversity and identify the major characteristics of plant phylogenetic divisions; explain how plants fit into the global ecological system and why they are essential for life on earth. (Biology 306)

For Institute students in all departments interested in the behavior of chemicals in the environment (see ESD listings for other subjects). Emphasis on man-made chemicals, their movement through water, air, soil, and their eventual fate. Physical transport, as well as chemical and biological sources and sinks, are discussed. Linkages to health effects, sources and control, and policy aspects.