What is the "Virtual Classroom Biology"?
The "Virtual Classroom Biology" is an educational site of the Radboud University Nijmegen, especially meant for secondary school students who like to have a first glance on teaching items of the Bio-science programs. One can find custom-made teaching material for courses from the biology training. The material presented here can be used along with lessons in classes or practical tutorials (pending ©).
Read further under "Highlights"...
Besides teaching material under "Students experience" there are pictures of tutorials and a movie created by students on how it is like to study Biology in Nijmegen. In the near future a number of YouTube videos taken during lectures of the bachelor program will be shown.
Watch further for biolology studies...
Highlights Virtual Classroom Biology
On this teaching site one can find an extensive image gallery of microscopical slides and a number ofrichly illustrated webmodules (
Go to the overview) related to the content of the bachelor courses or to topics from the reseach in the laboratories:
Image gallery: microscopical views with explanations
In the Image gallery one can examine hundreds labeled views of the same microscopical slides of plants and animal that are studied by biology students during practical courses.
Electron microscope in action
the examples of application of . With help of a simulator of the scanning electron microscope from the Huygens building you can discover the micro- and nano-structures in teaching and research material from biology, chemistry and physics.
Light microscopes and electron microscopes
How can structures smaller than a thousand of a millimeter be visualized? The pages on electron microscopy (
More ...), light microscopy (
More ...) and in the physics sister site on scanning probe microscopy (
More ...) provide explanations on the various techniques which enable this performance. There is a stereoviewer showing depth images collected with a laser microscope.
The duo "Mitosis and Meiosis"
Daughter cells, chromatides, crossing-over... what was already the significance of these words? These terms and many others on mitosis and meiosis, the two types of divisions occuring during the cell cycle, are summarized in this web module. These self-study pages contain many illustrations and links to video's. They were put together as a recapitulation for new biology students.
Landscape and Nature around Nijmegen
The surroundings of Nijmegen are known for their beautiful and varied natural resources (a region for walking and biking by excellence!): hills with woods on the glacial tills intersected by steep and humid dales with springs and brooks, sandfields, heather land with true fens, a typical river landscape with wilderness in former clay ditches and swamps on the poor soils. This web module, derived from the course "Biodiversity", focusses on the origin and evolution of each of these natural resources and on the vegetation characteristic for each area.
Hayfever and sex in plants? Pollen does it all.
More than 10% of the population of the Netherlands suffers of hay fever, a flaw triggered by pollen. Hayfever is an affection accompanied with irritation of the nose and throat mucus. In the multimedia web module about "Pollen" attention is paid to the biomedical aspects of hayfever and the plant species which cause this allergy. However, the actual function of pollen grains in nature, i.e. in the sexual reproduction of plants, and their biology is certainly not forgotten!
The Microworld of Leaves
Almost all life on terrestrial areas, including that of man, finally depends on the presence of leaves. In this web series we will see how these amazing plant organs are initiated and how they grow, capture light to produce oxygen and transfer water, and how adaptations are effective to allow their survival in the most diverse environments.
Embryology: "from alone", but also so complex
How wonderful, but also how outermost complex is the development from a fertilized egg into a mature embryo. In this web module we follow the main steps of the early embryology in a number of animal model species using drawings, photographs of microscopical sections and whole mount preparations (including free posters). This material is part of the courses on Developmental Physiology of Animals and Human Embryology.
Development of a stem: first-class architecture!
When one watches a stem from close, its architecture appears to be astonishing ingenious: branches are produced under various angles so that the leaves can optimally capture light. Water is supplied though tubings and the sugar production is transported. While the stem increases in length and diameter its scaffold remains strong, yet flexible. Here, the basical mechanisms behind the development of stems, a part of the first year courses in biology, are depicted with diagrams and photographs.
The Huygens building ... and time and space...
Huygens 4D presents background information and funny items (a panorama viewer, e-cards, pictures, movies) regarding the futuristic Huygens building hosting the Nijmegen Faculty of Sciences, to which the biology unit belongs. Also the history of the faculty is highlighted.
