Open access: a PLoS for education

Abstract

Teaching -- and testing -- students creatively is a challenge, but new public databases and more accessible literature are now helping to develop the critical thinking skills of students

Figure 1. Comparison of Published and Photocopied Figures

Example of an image that, when seen in color (A), is rich with information; much of this information is lost when it is photocopied by students (B), as when the original is held on reserve in the library, as is required for subscription-based journals, or is provided via interlibrary loan. This image of a developing fly embryo was labeled to reveal bands of differentially expressed proteins, with HAIRY in red, KRüPPEL in green, and GIANT in blue. (Image courtesy of Stephen W. Paddock, Jim Langeland, and Sean Carroll at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.)

Figure 2. Example of Student's Data Mining for Exam Question

Figure 2 from Bozdech et al. (2003) showing the gene expression profiles for 12 groups of genes expressed at different stages of Plasmodium life cycle inside red blood cells. Genomics students were asked to summarize this figure as a part of a take-home exam.