I now know what you mean by completely random questions in BIOC2101 (1 Viewer)

[Tim035]

This is mainly directed at Rekkusu who quoted some where that the questions in biochem tend to be completely random and difficult.
In the lectures everything seems relatively straight forward, nothing is overly complex etc...
Then I looked in the course manual at the 'study guide questions' for each module, and my jaw dropped, they are insane and go so far beyond anything in the lectures and in some cases even the text book.

 

[Survivor39]

Wait till you see the final exam questions.

 

[Rekkusu]

Lol exactly repeating what Survivor said.

When you have that Wet Practical Exam in 3-5 weeks time, be wary! Pay extreme attention to the Pracs preceding the Wet Prac Exam. If you know what to do for each, then you'll easily get the 15%.

Lol reminds me how I failed the Practical section because I was bloody 0.5 off from the "Supposedly experimentally correct microlitres". :jaw:

Final exam tends to incorporate MC with answers that have almost the same enzyme names, and you'll have to choose which one is incorrect.

You gotta love Mike Edwards though, his accent's really funny - Ok people, your assessments are due on Mondeey. And on Tuesdeey you have a lecture...

Molecular Biology (2201 - otherwise known as 2nd session Biochemistry) is relatively slightly easier than 2101, but also spews some random questions, if not - questions that rely on topics in which the lecturer did not explain their topics properly.

Don't worry, if you work hard, you'll get a pass and if lucky a credit. It's do-able, and better than 1st year chemistry courses

 

[Survivor39]

Really? The wet prac exam was hard? But we were shown how to do everything! Anyway, I remember I drew my absorbance curve wrong but still got 95%.

 

[Tim035]

If I work hard I'll get a pass, well thats not overly comforting lol....
First year chem I actually didn't mind, ok the lecturers weren't great but the course material was fairly easy and the exams were made up of modified questions from the tutorials.

I seriously don't get the 'study guide questions' though, like we never even had a lecture of carbohydrate structure, the guy just jumped straight into glycolysis, yet there are all these questions on structural names for different carbohydrates, reducing sugars etc etc.... I think the "quiz" we have on tuesday may help set the bench mark as to how hard this course may become.

BTW- Was it neccesary when you guys did the course to know all the amino acids and what category (polar, non poar, acidic, basic, ionizable side chains etc) they fell into? I think it'd be rather lame to have to as its just an extreme case of wrote learning.

 

[Rekkusu]

@Survivor: You lucky dude! I got Rebecca to teach our group for that week, because Anne got the pox. >< Which was quite unfortunate...and Rebecca's teaching didn't help either. Alot of students just did not know what to do, even after her explanation. (real jumbled dude)

Tim, don't worry too much! I worried heaps, but still got through this course. The study guide questions are quite useful, actually that's where the quizzes come from. But yes if they didn't teach it, don't bother. Otherwise have a quick search of the Biochemisty book (I used stryer)

Amino acids - It was required for Molecular Biology (i.e. remembering what amino acids were polar, non-polar but uncharged, acidic and basic. But not for biochemistry.

It may help you understand alot (i.e. remembering the structures of the amino acids), but unless if you have alot of time. Better off just remember as much as you can from the lecture notes.

Mike Edwards loves leaving spaces in his lecture notes so be wary of what words he left out in the lecture notes, and filled in - in the lecture slides.

For Biochemistry, the trick is to remember the whole TCA cycle, Glycolysis as well as Rebecca's nitrogen cycle. It's a must. But as well as that you must understand the background word for word. It's a sheer test of memory. If your brain can gobble up any crap you give it, then you'll pass this course with ease.

If you're one of us who have the memory of a nutshell, acronyms are the key.

Good luck Tim!

 

[Tim035]

Wait till you see the final exam questions.

Well the final was today, and yep BIOC2101 lived up to its name of producing some wtf questions, especially in the written answer section. I think the only questions where it was reasonably easy to figure out the answer or write a responce to were the ones relating to fat metabolism.

Thank god it's over "erases the names of 1000000 enzymes from brain".

 

[Rekkusu]

Haha you've got to do a high five! Surviving through this course alone is just so hard!

I'm not sure, but do you need to do a Practical Exam as well (During exam period)?
But anyway the theory alone is real wacked up, and its got too much course content. The course coordinator tends to have little or no time to fix this course up owing to his extra admin duties.

All the best for your other exams as well!

Ah Tim are you planning on Majoring in Medical Microbiology & Immunology? Or still thinking in the physiology field?

 

[Tim035]

We still have a 15% 'theory of practical' on monday, I'm about half way through going back through all the practicals, making sure I know all the enzymes and substrates we used, theory behind why things like ion exchange chromatography work etc etc...

I'm still planning to do a physiology or pharmacology major at this present time. Strangely enough microbiology is my best subject yet the one I least enjoy, whilst physiology is my worse (not to say I'm doing bad in it, comparatively) subject yet the one I most enjoy.

 

[Rekkusu]

Ah that's right. Yes be sure you know the practicals back to front. Though you'll find the exam to be more calculations based. God I wiped my memory clean after doing this course, by far my worst, killed my wam!

I better stop haha, might discourage you

Interesting, that's happened with alot of my friends who did Anatomy/Microbiology based majors/minors. In physiology I have heard that its really medically based with cadevers, etc, but extremely hard. Almost paralleled with ANAT2241.

In microbiology, it tends to be much much easier, all they talk about is peptidoglycan

 

[FeelBare]

Omg, pretty good final exams.

Anyone who's teetering between Fundamentals of Biochemistry and Principles of Biochemistry (adv) just do the advanced course; if it's just an extra wet practical (redundant?) exam that you're worried about, don't be (but you should be if you haven't been asking your lab demonstrator question, haven't written jack down or have a shit demonstrator [but even then you can still ask questions directly related to the material in the test during the prac exam [may or may not be true for the upcoming years lol]).

@ Tim: If you don't mind me asking, which paper did you get for the wet practical???

Now... physiology is the real bitch.


And thanks for the tip off about the theory of practical exam format, Rekkusu! All we got in the sample paper was MCQ that seem harmless.

 

[ichiraku]

Better yet, don't even take Biochemistry if you can help it =P. Oh wait, I think it's a pre req for a lot of 2nd session and 3rd year courses. It's not a bad subject, the course content is pretty interesting but as mentioned above there is way too much material (especially since it's all squished into 12 weeks now) and a lot of it is just ROTE leaning reactions or enzyme names. It helps as well if you are good at integrating a whole load of information and can see relationships which can form between different metabolic processes. Labs suck ass though...

I thought that exam wasn't too difficult but a few of the short answer questions required knowledge way above what was covered in those lectures. Question 3 (the one on mitochondrial efficiency and ROS) was really messed up, especially in the last part asking about Alzheimer's disease. Wth, I don't even remember covering that during lectures. First short answer question also took me like 5 minutes to realise that the "pathway" they were referring to probably wasn't one we actually studied - I was freaking out all throughout reading time going through every aerobic pathway I could think of. The rest of the paper was alright, I guess. 10 minutes per short answer is pretty insufficient though to give a good, detailed answer in my opinion.

I was considering taking that course called Human Biochemistry next year in session 2. Anybody actually taken the course before and willing to post up their review of it? It sounds like it will cover some pretty cool content (judging by what the handbook says), but if it's just gonna be learning more pathways and reactions, then hell no.

 

[Survivor39]

ichiraku: I'm glad you've survived biochem exam. Third year biochem courses are completely different (as suggested by many of my friends). Human biochem is especially interesting because you are not required to memorise those pathways anymore. You apply biochemistry to human metabolism. One of the prac requires you to documen everything you ate for 1 week and see what calories ar ebeing consumed or something along that line. A few friends highly recommended it.


Rekkusu: How was your Bacteria and Disease presentation? I've heard one person from one of the group on the last presentation day dragged on for ever and Hazel was trying to get him to finish up so his team mates can speak! Hopefully that wasn't your group

Tim: I'm sure you'll do just fine with biochem, judging from your mid-session in Micro. And well done on getting the highest mark for the mid session - no one got 100% ANAT2241 Histology was an interesting subject! But I hated studying for it. Apparently only 2 people in my year got an HD for Histology.

 

[Tim035]

I thought that exam wasn't too difficult but a few of the short answer questions required knowledge way above what was covered in those lectures. Question 3 (the one on mitochondrial efficiency and ROS) was really messed up, especially in the last part asking about Alzheimer's disease. Wth, I don't even remember covering that during lectures. First short answer question also took me like 5 minutes to realise that the "pathway" they were referring to probably wasn't one we actually studied - I was freaking out all throughout reading time going through every aerobic pathway I could think of. The rest of the paper was alright, I guess. 10 minutes per short answer is pretty insufficient though to give a good, detailed answer in my opinion.
..

The first question asked didn't seem like there was 10 marks worth of stuff to talk about. However microbiology students actually had an advantage in the 2nd part of the question, because it was related to selective toxicity, where a drug could target enzymes in the parasites oxidatative cycle, without inhibiting that of the hosts, as they are most likely unique to that of the parasite.
The mitochondrial efficiency one, I spoke a lot of half truths..... I correctly stated in the alzcheimers question that mitochondrial defficency would decreases, causing a drop in ADP:O ratio, but the reasons why this occur, I was a bit off.....

For the question that asked- Which complex would be unaffected in the 3 cell lines, what did you guys put?
- I guessed 2, just because it's unique in not pumping H+ ions, or relying on the membrane for ATP formation.
Enzyme one was easy, fat synthesis vs. breakdown easy, cori cycle I wish I'd given a bit more detail but I was pushed for time.

@ Fellbare- For the wet Prac I got paper C. I kinda stuffed up the last question by not changing mg -->g in order to find molar concentration lol. Got above the average, Just.... Can't believe their is a guy who has gotten 25/25 quiz 1, 25/25 quiz 2 and 50/50 for the wet prac.

 

[Rekkusu]

Rekkusu: How was your Bacteria and Disease presentation? I've heard one person from one of the group on the last presentation day dragged on for ever and Hazel was trying to get him to finish up so his team mates can speak! Hopefully that wasn't your group

Oh God, Survivor, please tell me that Hazel isn't going to deduct alot of marks! Cos I was in that group. Remember how I came into your lab that day to copy the Rickettsia lecture notes onto Hazel's PC?

Yeah lol if you ever see this guy again, he's called Zi (he was our last speaker), guy never turns up to our meetings, until I get real cranky and start threatening my group members. Our first group member: Sigit, did indeed drag on, he went on for bloody 20 minutes!

Hm if Hazel marks Bacteria and Disease more based upon each individual's efforts I'll be happy. If not, then I'm so bloody screwed cos my group (2 ppl) printed a slab of crap, and started reading it out, that's why our group went on for 40 minutes. Hopefully I sort of entertained everyone with my section of the lecture.
>.< Ah Bugger there goes 15% of my B & D marks...

@Tim, Feelbare, ichi: Pretty much in Biochemistry, if you have a good demonstrator you will get full marks. But if you get a real crappy demo/tutor I won't name names, since hehe a BABS staff is here, you will get crap marks. Actually that is what happens with alot of university subjects. The best thing about 3rd year is that the lecturers do everything, this way its taught alot better.

Oh btw, did you MICR2011 students do any Antibiotics lectures by say Prof Mitchell?

 

[Tim035]

Yeah we had her for 4 lectures on antibiotics, definatly the most interesting part of the course.

 

[Survivor39]

Oh God, Survivor, please tell me that Hazel isn't going to deduct alot of marks! Cos I was in that group. Remember how I came into your lab that day to copy the Rickettsia lecture notes onto Hazel's PC?

Yeah lol if you ever see this guy again, he's called Zi (he was our last speaker), guy never turns up to our meetings, until I get real cranky and start threatening my group members. Our first group member: Sigit, did indeed drag on, he went on for bloody 20 minutes!

Hm if Hazel marks Bacteria and Disease more based upon each individual's efforts I'll be happy. If not, then I'm so bloody screwed cos my group (2 ppl) printed a slab of crap, and started reading it out, that's why our group went on for 40 minutes. Hopefully I sort of entertained everyone with my section of the lecture.
>.< Ah Bugger there goes 15% of my B & D marks...

When I did the course, we had a group mark, so everyone in the group got the same mark (unless when you do peer assessment of each other you assess the others badly and say this person did no work etc).

Personally I like presentations but I don't like the idea of having to get marked along with other presenters. Each individuals should get their own mark (but obviously the group has to be coherent and each presenter's talk is linked with the next person's).

And people who don't pull their weight... well, what can I say. I guess it comes down to luck when you choose group memebers.

When is the Bacteria and Disease exam? Good luck!

 

[FeelBare]

@ Rekkusu: Aren't you allowed to 'dob people in' when they don't won't contribute to group work (and if you're not at a meeting that's not much contributing anyways)? This chick in a gen ed got half of our marks I think... lucky for her we got 27/30.

@Tim: No. Way. O_O I got paper A but I think I fluked it because I didn't even know how do find dilution factor for unknown until the night before, just because this lab demonstrator (not mine) put up some practical exam practice questions... saved my life, got 40/50. -.-

Sigh @ Ken, he's great and all, but he seems to choose the hardest way to explain things...

 

[Tim035]

@ Rekkusu: Aren't you allowed to 'dob people in' when they don't won't contribute to group work (and if you're not at a meeting that's not much contributing anyways)? This chick in a gen ed got half of our marks I think... lucky for her we got 27/30.

@Tim: No. Way. O_O I got paper A but I think I fluked it because I didn't even know how do find dilution factor for unknown until the night before, just because this lab demonstrator (not mine) put up some practical exam practice questions... saved my life, got 40/50. -.-

Sigh @ Ken, he's great and all, but he seems to choose the hardest way to explain things...

Yeah, I didn't have the greatest tutor either. In the small group tutorials, they just wrote the answers straight off the sheet on to the board and told us to copy them down, that'd be about it.
You beat me by 1...... I knew theoretically how to do everything for every task a week out from it, but practically I'm certain I screwed up.
Does molecular biology have a wet prac exam?

 

[FeelBare]

No idea, but I've heard there are many many little quizzes every week o_o so that'd be a lovely area to lose small marks =(.