NEUROSCIENCE FOR THE BLIND

by Paul Pietsch, PhD
Indiana University
School of Optometry

Lesson 01 Introduction to Neurobiology I

First, I would like to tell you about some exercises on the tape you may not be able to do. Fortunately, that segment comes 33 minutes into the tape, and after the main topics have been covered. That later segment, which the student may regard as optional, involves building models of the basic structure of proteins. The lessons were first presented in a classroom setting where the students were given cassette tapes as well as model kits. There is still no convenient way to supply those kits in cyberspace. "But just give those computer kids time," one of my friends says. Anyway, just in case, I decided not to amputate that part of the tape. And I will talk about the kits at the bottom of the page.

Now as to the tape! A friend of mine, who knows about these things, suggests that the student download the tape into his or her computer where he or she will have good control over pausing, stopping, starting, etc. By the way, the tape is already in the mp3 format,

Okay, when you are ready for the tape just CLICK HERE!

OPTIONAL SEGMENT (33:09 min ff). As already mentioned, the latter part of the tape involves model-building. This is done with what are called CPK models. For the various lessons the parts are arranged in kits, three for the present lesson.
The present kits are in envelopes, or bags, of different sizes: Small, Medium and Large. The specific contents of SMALL, MEDIUM and LARGE are as follows:

1. SMALL BAG contains 4 things:
   1. Amino acid (already assembled) - what the student builds first
   2. Head -- Amino group (NH₂)
   3. Body (with what the narrator calls the alpha carbon) - a tetrahedral C
   4. Tail -- carboxyl group (with beta carbon - amide C)
2. MEDIUM BAG ('intermediate' on tape) contains 4 things:
   1. Water H₂O
   2. Head
   3. Body
   4. Tail
      NOTE the head, body and tail may already be assembled.
3. LARGE BAG contains 3 things:
   1. Methyl group CH₃ -- to make ALANINE
   2. Phenyl group (benzene ring with CH₂) -- for PHENYL-alanine
   3. Sulfhydryl group (SH) -- for CYSTEINE

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: Thank you Mary Stores for your helping make this lesson more accessible.