Introduction to biology 1400-111WDB

Lecture 1. The nature of life (what is life?)
Contents: basic features of living beings, mechanism of Darwinian evolution, definition of life with and without theory of evolution, life without proteins and genes, the RNA World; Wächtershäuser's concept of 'primeval pizza'.
Lecture 2. Theory of cell (why individuals exist?)
Contents: consequences of delimitation of life processes with lipid membrane, functional meaning of transport across membrane, transformation of chemical energy into mechanical with ATPases, profits from having the cell wall, antibiotics.
Lecture 3. Physiology of organellae (how the cell works?)
Contents: internal organization of bacterial cell; relationships within bacteria, origin of the eukaryotic cell and physiological processes inside it, possible symbiotic origin of chloroplasts and mitochondria, structure of the cytoskeleton.
Lecture 4. Effects of having nucleus (how genome works?)
Contents: compartments within the cell and cytoskeleton, separation of transcription from translation, introns and nuclear membrane, segregation of chromosomes and structure of flagellum, meiosis, functioning of the cell in environment.
Lecture 5. Individuals in ecosystems (why they are so diverse?)
Contents: limitations for size of individuals, population dynamics, heterogeneity of the environment, theory of island biogeography, necessity of predation and parasitism, trophic pyramid, energy flow across ecosystems.
Lecture 6. Consequences of sex (why some individuals are similar to each other?)
Contents: determination of sex, concept of biological species and speciation, measures of biodiversity, taxonomy, systematics and evolutionary phylogenetics, principles of taxonomic nomenclature.
Lecture 7. Regulation of development (how genetic information is used?)
Contents: purpose of multicellularity, genetic clone, mechanisms of regulation of development, expression of homeotic genes, morphogenetic factors, hormones, pheromones.
Lecture 8. Organization of plants (what makes plants different from animals?)
Contents: meaning of alternation of gametophyte and sporophyte phases, adaptation of vascular plants to life on lands, regulation of development of flower and its function, evolutionary meaning of biogenic toxins.
Lecture 9. Exploration of space (what is an animal?)
Contents: homology of segmental homeotic genes; function of collagen and basement membrane, hydraulic skeleton and body cavities, chitinous and keratinous body covers, phosphatic skeleton, sense organs and nervous system.
Lecture 10. Defence of integrality (how to fight parasites?)
Contents: protection against environmental threats, mechanism of immunological reactions, evolution of their specificity, post-meiotic recombination as the source of diversity of lymphocyte receptors and clonal selection of immunoglobulins.
Lecture 11. Causes of convergence (where leads evolution?)
Contents: engineering constraints on evolutionary convergences, aerodynamic properties of flying and hydrodynamic of swimming animals, increase of complexity in evolution of brain, transition from instincts to learning.
Lecture 12. Symbiosis and altruism (who deserves to be supported?)
Contents: kin selection and game theory in explaining cooperation of organisms, evolution of clonal organisms, mechanisms of diversification in superorganisms, evolution of behavior in the fossil record.
Lecture 13. Changing Earth (how natural environment is transformed?)
Contents: factors controlling climate, Coriolis force and Milanković cyclicity, history and prehistory of climate transformations, difficulties with estimating human influence on the natural environment.
Lecture 14. Humans as a product of nature in opposition to it (are we animals?)
Contents: man as an animal species, biogeographic context of its evolution, evolutionary explanation of human behavior and social structure, separating culture from biology, social evolution.