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- Bivall, Petter, 1979-
(författare)
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Touching the Essence of Life : Haptic Virtual Proteins for Learning
- 2010
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation presents research in the development and use of a multi-modal visual and haptic virtual model in higher education. The model, named Chemical Force Feedback (CFF), represents molecular recognition through the example of protein-ligand docking, and enables students to simultaneously see and feel representations of the protein and ligand molecules and their force interactions. The research efforts have been divided between educational research aspects and development of haptic feedback techniques.The CFF model was evaluated in situ through multiple data-collections in a university course on molecular interactions. To isolate possible influences of haptics on learning, half of the students ran CFF with haptics, and the others used the equipment with force feedback disabled. Pre- and post-tests showed a significant learning gain for all students. A particular influence of haptics was found on students reasoning, discovered through an open-ended written probe where students' responses contained elaborate descriptions of the molecular recognition process.Students' interactions with the system were analyzed using customized information visualization tools. Analysis revealed differences between the groups, for example, in their use of visual representations on offer, and in how they moved the ligand molecule. Differences in representational and interactive behaviours showed relationships with aspects of the learning outcomes.The CFF model was improved in an iterative evaluation and development process. A focus was placed on force model design, where one significant challenge was in conveying information from data with large force differences, ranging from very weak interactions to extreme forces generated when atoms collide. Therefore, a History Dependent Transfer Function (HDTF) was designed which adapts the translation of forces derived from the data to output forces according to the properties of the recently derived forces. Evaluation revealed that the HDTF improves the ability to haptically detect features in volumetric data with large force ranges.To further enable force models with high fidelity, an investigation was conducted to determine the perceptual Just Noticeable Difference (JND) in force for detection of interfaces between features in volumetric data. Results showed that JNDs vary depending on the magnitude of the forces in the volume and depending on where in the workspace the data is presented.
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| 2. |
- Bohlin, Gustav, 1981-
(författare)
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Evolving germs – Antibiotic resistance and natural selection in education and public communication
- 2017
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Bacterial resistance to antibiotics threatens modern healthcare on a global scale. Several actors in society, including the general public, must become more involved if this development is to be countered. The conveyance of relevant information provided through education and media reports is therefore of high concern. Antibiotic resistance evolves through the mechanisms of natural selection; in this way, a sound understanding of these mechanisms underlies explanations of causes and the development of effective risk-reduction measures. In addition to natural selection functioning as an explanatory framework to antibiotic resistance, bacterial resistance as a context seems to possess a number of qualities that make it suitable for teaching natural selection – a subject that has been proven notoriously hard to teach and learn. A recently suggested approach for learning natural selection involves so-called threshold concepts, which encompass abstract and integrative ideas. The threshold concepts associated with natural selection include, among others, the notions of randomness as well as vast spatial and temporal scales. Illustrating complex relationships between concepts on different levels of organization is one, of several, areas where visualizations are efficient. Given the often-imperceptible nature of threshold concepts as well as the fact that natural selection processes occur on different organizational levels, visual accounts of natural selection have many potential benefits for learning.Against this background, the present dissertation explores information conveyed to the public regarding antibiotic resistance and natural selection, as well as investigates how these topics are presented together, by scrutinizing media including news reports, websites, educational textbooks and online videos. The principal method employed in the media studies was content analysis, which was complemented with various other analytical procedures. Moreover, a classroom study was performed, in which novice pupils worked with a series of animations explaining the evolution of antibiotic resistance. Data from individual written assignments, group questions and video-recorded discussions were collected and analyzed to empirically explore the potential of antibiotic resistance as a context for learning about evolution through natural selection.Among the findings are that certain information, that is crucial for the public to know, about antibiotic resistance was conveyed to a low extent through wide-reaching news reporting. Moreover, explanations based on natural selection were rarely included in accounts of antibiotic resistance in any of the examined media. Thus, it is highly likely that a large proportion of the population is never exposed to explanations for resistance development during education or through newspapers. Furthermore, the few examples that were encountered in newspapers or textbooks were hardly ever visualized, but presented only in textual form. With regard to videos purporting to explain natural selection, it was found that a majority lacked accounts of central key concepts. Additionally, explanations of how variation originates on the DNA-level were especially scarce. These and other findings coming from the content analyses are discussed through the lens of scientific literacy and could be used to inform and strengthen teaching and scientific curricula with regards to both antibiotic resistance and evolution. Furthermore, several factors of interest for using antibiotic resistance in the teaching of evolution were identified from the classroom study. These involve, among others, how learners’ perception of threshold concepts such as randomness and levels of organization in space and time are affected by the bacterial context
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| 3. |
- Rundgren, Carl-Johan, 1973-
(författare)
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Visual thinking, visual speech : a semiotic perspective on meaning-making in molecular life science : how visualizations, metaphors and help-words contribute to the formation of knowledge about proteins among upper secondary and tertiary level students
- 2008
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Molecular life science has become one of the fastest-growing fields of scientific and technical innovation. An important issue for tomorrow’s education is to meet the challenge posed by various facets of molecular life science. Images, diagrams and other forms of visualization are playing increasingly important roles in molecular life science teaching and research, both for conveying information and as conceptual tools, transforming the way we think about the events and processes the subject covers.This thesis highlights different aspects of molecular life science education: the rapid production and flow of information, its multi- and interdisciplinary character, the complexity of life phenomena and our knowledge of them, and the high level of abstraction of the knowledge produced. This study also examines how upper secondary and tertiary students interpret visualizations of proteins. The participating upper secondary students were taking different variants of the natural science program in the second (grade 11) or third (grade 12) year. A set of 20 upper secondary students, and four third-year biochemistry students were interviewed in semistructured, revised clinical interviews. Furthermore, 31 university students participated in a group discussion and answered a questionnaire. The interviews, group discussions and questionnaires were structured around 2D illustrations of proteins and an animated representation of water molecules being transported through a channel in the cell membrane.Three critical features of the ability to visualize molecular processes were identified: the complexity of biomolecular processes, the dynamic and stochastic nature of biomolecular interaction, and extrapolation between 2D and 3D. The results also indicate that the students may possess an understanding of a process which they cannot express in words.Furthermore, the results indicate that beginner students use a kind of intermediate language when learning a new content area, frequently making use of metaphors, some that they have obtained from their teaching and some that they create themselves, i.e. spontaneous metaphors. They also make use of words that seemingly have no meaning, such as “plupp” and “flopp”. These words are here referred to as help-words. The results from this study indicate that spontaneous metaphors and helpwords do take on a meaning in learning situations and that they play a role in the meaning-making of the students. Moreover, the results indicate that difficulties in science education may to a large degree be connected to the problems of communicating the precise and general nature of scientific terms.
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