SYLLABUS
MB 461
Introduction to Molecular Virology

Instructor Information

Instructor:	Tim Petty
Office:	4602 Gardner Hall (South)
Phone:	515-2393
e-mail:	tim_petty@ncsu.edu
Office Hours:	By appointment

More course information: MB 461 (only available during semester course is offered.)

This class meets MWF 10:15–11:05 a.m. in room GA 2207, or as specified in TRACS.

Prerequisites

All students should have General Microbiology (MB 351) and Medical Microbiology (MB 411), or their equivalent.  Some background in basic biochemistry, cell biology and genetics is desirable, but not required.

Course Description and Objectives

The aim of this course is to introduce students to important principles of modern molecular virology. The general principles will be briefly outlined in the introductory lectures.  Subsequent lectures will illustrate and reiterate these principles using specific detailed case studies of individual viruses. During the course, students will: (1) gain an overview of important fundamental principles of virology; and, (2) study specific viruses and derive important paradigms of molecular virology.

Attendance Policy

This is an upper-division class and attendance will not be taken. However, material from all the lectures will be used in the exams, so regular attendance is strongly recommended!

Academic Integrity Policy

All students are expected to be familiar with and abide by the NC State University Code of Student Conduct.  Academic dishonesty, such as cheating, plagiarism, or helping others to cheat or plagiarize will not be tolerated.  All students are expected to abide by the NC State University academic integrity policy as set forth in the Code of Student Conduct.

Disability Statement

Reasonable accommodations are made for students with disabilities to ensure that their academic requirements can be met successfully.  For information, students should contact Disability Services for Students, 1900 Student Health Center (phone 515-7653; TTY 515-8830).

Grading Policy

There will be two 50 minute exams before the end of the semester, one prior to Spring break (exam I) and one after (exam II), and a 2 hour final exam which will be scheduled at the end of the semester.  There will also be six 10 minute quizzes (approximately biweekly).  The quizzes will have five questions that are worth two points each.  The exams will not include multiple-choice or long essay-type questions. A short answer or outline format will be used, and the questions will be designed to elicit answers which emphasize general principles of virology and include reference to specific illustrative examples discussed in the lectures.  For the two exams before the end of the semester (I and II), students will be required to answer four questions from a choice of five.  Each question will be worth twenty points.  For the final exam, students will be required to answer eight questions from a choice of ten.  Again, each question will be worth twenty points.  All exams will be cumulative and students will be held responsible for all material covered in the lectures.

Letter grades for the course will be assigned as follows: 96-100% A+; 91-95% A; 86-90% A-; 81-85% B+; 76-80% B; 71-75% B-; 66-70% C+; 61-65% C; 56-60% C-; 51-55% D+; 46-50% D; 41-45% D-; <41% F.  Final grades will be calculated from the aggregate of the quizzes, exams during the semester (I and II), and final exam grades.  Together, the quizzes (best 5 out of 6) will count for 11% of the final grade, exams during the semester (I and II) will count for 22% of the final grade each, and the final exam will count for the remaining 45% of the final grade.

Policies on Excused Absences, Scheduling Makeup Work, and Incomplete grades

Students who miss a quiz or exam will allowed to make up the missed work, at the mutual convenience of the student and the instructor, if they obtain prior permission from the instructor, or in the case of health-related absences they provide a valid doctor’s note after the fact.  An incomplete (IN) grade will be given only in the case that a student who is eligible to make up missed work (as above) is unable to do so before the end of the semester in which the course is taught.

Course Texts

There is no required textbook for the course.  However, for students who want a book, I suggest "Fundamental Virology" (D.M. Knipe and P.M. Howley, Ed.s, 4th edn., Lippincott-Williams, ISBN 0-7817-1833-3).  This text covers the majority (although not all) of the material used in the course.  A useful reference text is; "Fields Virology" (D.M. Knipe and P.M. Howley,  Ed.s, 4th edn., Lippincott-Williams) – detailed and up-to-date animal-medical virology text) – available on reserve in the D.H. Hill Library.

Electronic Resources

There are a large number of Internet resources available to virologists.  For interested students in MB 461, good places to begin are the World-Wide Web Virology Pages of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, or “All the Virology on the World-Wide Web” hosted by the Garry Laboratory at Tulane University School of Medicine.

During the course there will be 40 lectures, which will cover the following topics.

General Principles:

What are viruses? Where are they found?

Virus classification and nomenclature.

Virus structure.

Interaction of viruses with cells.

Interaction of viruses with organisms (immunology, pathology).

Interaction of viruses with populations (epidemiology).

Case Studies:

Picornaviruses.

Togaviruses.

Orthomyxoviruses.

Retroviruses.

Polyomaviruses.

Herpesviruses.