COURSE CONTENT:
Through this course, students will acquire a broad spectrum of knowledge about how biotechnology has developed since the beginnings of human civilization, illustrated by examples such as fermentations in brewing/winemaking, baking, and cheese production. They will become familiar with the ever-growing range of applications of modern biotechnology: production of antibiotics, vitamins, amino acids, steroid hormones, peptides, enzymes, vaccines, and food additives such as aspartame and fructose syrup. Topics will include the creation of transgenic domestic animals, genetically modified (GM) plants, and production microorganisms. Major global biotechnology companies will be mentioned, as well as the process of intellectual property protection and the granting of patents in biotechnology. An outline of the legal framework related to genetically modified organisms in the Republic of Croatia and worldwide will also be covered.
LECTURE TOPICS:
1. Biotechnology: historical development and its key milestones. Branches of modern biotechnology. Domestication of plants and animals. Fermentations: beer, wine, cheese, and bread.
2. Classical biotechnological processes: types of bioreactors. Optimization of the production process: production organisms, nutrient media, scale-up, contamination, and quality control.
3. Downstream processing: purification and concentration of the desired product. Types of chromatography.
4. Production of whole microorganisms: baker?s yeast, probiotics/prebiotics. Spirulina and Chlorella.
5. Production of amino acids. Aspartame and artificial sweeteners. Production of organic acids.
6. Production of steroid hormones. Synthesis of vitamins C and B. Industrial enzymes.
7. Biodiesel. Bioplastics from biomass. Insulin, growth hormone, interferons.
8. Antibiotic production: medical and non-medical applications. Discovery of new classes of antibiotics.
9. Plant biotechnology. GM plants. Conventional vs. GM agriculture: advantages and disadvantages. CRISPR plants.
10. Stem cells, animal cloning, and GM animals. Artificial insemination and manipulation of animal embryos. Reproductive and non-reproductive human cloning.
11. Vaccines: conventional, recombinant, and DNA/RNA vaccines. Recombinant antibodies in biomedicine: chimeric, humanized, and fully human antibodies. Molecular diagnostics: immunodetection methods, DNA markers and fingerprinting, isothermal PCR.
12. Intellectual property protection and patent law. Biotechnology companies. The process of establishing a spin-off company based on scientific discovery. Patenting genes and organisms.
13. Legal regulations concerning GMOs in the Republic of Croatia and worldwide. The Croatian GMO Act. EU regulation on new genomic techniques.
SEMINARS:
Students will independently or in pairs prepare seminar papers analyzing a number of research works related to one of the lecture topics. They will also be allowed to propose topics of their own interest if they are well aligned with the course content. Seminar papers will be presented as multimedia lectures, followed by a Q&A session and discussion moderated by the instructor. As part of the seminar program, a visit to a biotechnology institution/company in Zagreb is planned (e.g., a craft brewery, Pliva, Pfizer, Biocentar).
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- Na pregledan (i vrlo simpatičan) način prikazan je najveći dio tema koje ćemo obrađivati na predavanju.
- Obrađuje neke teme s predavanja koje nisu u obveznoj literaturi.
- Udžbenik je složen da za svaku temu ima 1 stranicu teksta i 1 stranicu sa crtežima i shemama koje prate tekst. Vrlo vizualan pristup biotehnologiji.
- Najbolji znanstveni časopis (mjesečnik) o biotehnologiji. Osim klasičnih znanstvenih i preglednih radova, obiluje vijestima iz svijeta biotehnologije: patenti, klinička istraživanja, trendovi, nove kompanije itd. Pristup časopisu će ići preko predavača.
- Relativno star udžbenik, ali sadrži vrlo dobre ilustracije koje su korištene i u predavanjima. Nema novijih izdanja.
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Pristupačnost
