Biology is designed for multi-semester biology courses for science majors. It is grounded on an evolutionary basis and includes exciting features that highlight careers in the biological sciences and everyday applications of the concepts at hand. To meet the needs of today’s instructors and students, some content has been strategically condensed while maintaining the overall scope and coverage of traditional texts for this course. Instructors can customize the book, adapting it to the approach that works best in their classroom. Biology also includes an innovative art program that incorporates critical thinking and clicker questions to help students understand—and apply—key concepts.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Compare innate and learned behaviorDiscuss how movement and migration behaviors are a result of natural selectionDiscuss the different ways members of a population communicate with each otherGive examples of how species use energy for mating displays and other courtship behaviorsDifferentiate between various mating systemsDescribe different ways that species learn

Students pass around and distort messages written on index cards to learn how we use signals from GPS occultations to study the atmosphere. The cards represent information sent from GPS satellites being distorted as they pass through different locations in the Earth's atmosphere and reach other satellites. Analyzing GPS occultations enables better global weather forecasting, storm tracking and climate change monitoring.

Filtering is the process of removing or separating the unwanted part of a mixture. In signal processing, filtering is specifically used to remove or extract part of a signal, and this can be accomplished using an analog circuit or a digital device (such as a computer). In this lesson, students learn the impact filtering can have on different types of signals, the concepts of frequency and spectrum, and the connections these topics have to real-world signals such as musical signals. Students also learn the roles that these concepts play in designing different types of filters. The lesson content prepares students for the associated activity in which they use an online demo and a variety of filters to identify the message in a distress signal heavily corrupted by noise.

Students learn the basic principles of filtering as well as how to apply digital filters to extract part of an audio signal by using an interactive online demo website. They apply this knowledge in order to isolate a voice recording from a heavily noise-contaminated sound wave. After completing the associated lesson, expect students to be able to attempt (and many successfully finish) this activity with minimal help from the instructor.

Today GPS is critical to positioning, navigation, and timing. The smooth functioning of financial transactions, air traffic, ATMs, cell phones and modern life in general around the world depend on GPS. This very criticality requires continuous modernization. The oldest satellites in the current constellation were launched in the 1990s. If you imagine using a computer of that vintage today, it is not surprising that the system is being substantially updated. Global Positioning System (GPS) is now a part of a growing international con?text-the Global Navigation Satellite System, GNSS. This course dives into how GPS and other GNSS systems are designed, how they operate, and the impacts they have on spatial analysis and spatially-enabled systems.

This course is about the study of speech sounds; how we produce and perceive them and their acoustic properties. Topics include the influence of the production and perception systems on phonological patterns and sound change, students learn acoustic analysis and experimental techniques. Students taking the graduate version complete different assignments.

Students learn about the remote sensing radio occultation technique and how engineers use it with GPS satellites to monitor and study the Earth's atmospheric activity. Students may be familiar with some everyday uses of GPS, but not as familiar with how GPS technology contributes to our ongoing need for great amounts of ever-changing global atmospheric data for accurate weather forecasting, storm tracking and climate change monitoring. GPS occultations are when GPS signals sent from one satellite to another are altered (delayed, refracted) by the atmosphere passed though, such that they can be analyzed to remotely learn about the planet's atmospheric conditions.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"CRSPR-Cas is a powerful gene editing tool for the therapy of human diseases But its potential for fighting human disease remains untapped Part of the problem is that different CRISPR-Cas systems use different PAM sequences to activate their editing functions and how to directly identify functional PAM sequences in human cells is still an open question Now, researchers have developed PAM Definition by Observable Sequence Excision (PAM-DOSE), a technique for identifying these secret genetic phrases It starts with using bacteria to generate a large library of random sequences on circular strands of DNA Each random sequence is flanked by tdTomato and EGFP to express red and green fluorescent proteins when implanted in a cell Only the correct sequences activate the corresponding CRISPR-Cas pair, whose function is to remove the red-protein portion So a green-only signal indicates a right answer Next-generation sequencing then reveals the details of the correct PAM sequence In a proof-of-principle experiment, the se.."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This course explores the detection and measurement of radio and optical signals encountered in communications, astronomy, remote sensing, instrumentation, and radar. Topics covered include: statistical analysis of signal processing systems, including radiometers, spectrometers, interferometers, and digital correlation systems; matched filters and ambiguity functions; communications channel performance; measurement of random electromagnetic fields, angular filtering properties of antennas, interferometers, and aperture synthesis systems; and radiative transfer and parameter estimation.

Students work as if they are electrical engineers to program a keyboard to play different audible tones depending on where a sensor is pressed. They construct the keyboard from a soft potentiometer, an Arduino capable board, and a small speaker. The soft potentiometer “keyboard” responds to the pressure of touch on its eight “keys” (C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C) and feeds an input signal to the Arduino-capable board. Each group programs a board to take the input and send an output signal to the speaker to produce a tone that is dependent on the input signal—that is, which “key” is pressed. After the keyboard is working, students play "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" and (if time allows) modify the code so that different keys or a different number of notes can be played.

Echolocation is the ability to orient by transmitting sound and receiving echoes from objects in the environment. As a result of a Marco-Polo type activity and subsequent lesson, students learn basic concepts of echolocation. They use these concepts to understand how dolphins use echolocation to locate prey, escape predators, navigate their environment, such as avoiding gillnets set by commercial fishing vessels. Students will also learn that dolphin sounds are vibrations created by vocal organs, and that sound is a type of wave or signal that carries energy and information especially in the dolphin's case. Students will learn that a dolphin's sense of hearing is highly enhanced and better than that of human hearing. Students will also be introduced to the concept of by-catch Students will learn what happens to animals caught through by-catch and why.