Current Seminar Courses

SEMINAR COURSES

CMB students are required to complete three 1- or 2- credit Seminar courses.  These courses can include CMB 800 courses or any courses listed below.  Seminar courses not listed below must be approved by the CMB Director. 

Courses listed below are categorized as literature-based or writing/professional development courses.  There are two options for completing the three seminar requirements.

1. Take 3 literature-based courses.
2. Take two literature-based courses plus one writing/professional development course.

Please note that although the semester indicated is typical for each course, each course is not necessarily offered every year.  If only the Semester is listed for a given course, please check to verify whether the course will be offered.

If you know of a course, or are interested in a course, that is not listed below, please let us know!

LITERATURE REVIEW COURSES
These should constitute at least two of your three required seminar course

Mitochondria in Health and Disease
Number: PSL 950 Section 4
Course Director: Jason Bazil
Credits:1
Semester: Fall
Description: This one credit seminar course will examine mitochondria and their role in normal physiology and disease. Students will read, present and discuss journal articles with the group related to mitochondria and their impacts on function. Via these activities, students will learn the cutting-edge techniques used to study mitochondrial structure and function, how to utilize them and their relative advantages and weaknesses. Students will also develop their skill in critical evaluation of the literature, experimental design and scientific communication.

Motivated Behaviors
Number: PSL 950 Section 2
Course Director: Michelle Mazei-Robison, AJ Robison, Gina Leinninger
Credits:1
Semester: Fall
Description: This one credit seminar course will examine the neuronal circuitry regulating motivated behaviors, such as intake of drugs, natural rewards, or avoidance of aversive stress, anxiety or pain. The instructors' expertise ranges across many motivated behaviors, and together they support a broad, dynamic discussion of this field. Students will read, present and discuss journal articles with the group on the neuronal regulation of motivated behavior. Via these activities, students will learn the cutting-edge techniques used to study neural regulation of behavior, how to utilize them and their relative advantages and weaknesses. Students will also develop their skill in critical evaluation of the literature, experimental design and scientific communication.

Physiology Seminars
Number: PSL 950 Section 1
Course Director: Geoffroy Laumet, Eunhee Yi, Qingguang Zhang
Credits: 1
Semester: Fall
Description: This is a one-credit journal club-style course, which meets once per week. Each week, a student will present/discuss a paper from the Physiology seminar speaker that is presenting the following week. The idea is to expose students to the speaker’s work, get them more comfortable with their ideas & techniques, to have better engagement during the speaker’s lunch and seminar.

TOPICS IN MOLECULAR PLANT SCIENCE
Number: PLB 802 Section 2 or BMB 906
Course Director: Sangbum Park
Credits: 1
Semester: Fall & Spring
Description: This course will critically assess recent work of each Molecular Plant Sciences Seminar Series speaker during the semester. Each week of the semester, we will discuss a recent publication by the speaker from that week’s seminar. One student will present a paper each week for discussion, highlighting the methods used and key findings. Students will be expected to actively participate in discussion and will develop their critical thinking skills and expand their molecular plant science knowledge base. Please enroll thru whichever department you want the course to show up as, on your transcript. Course will meet in room 147 Plant Biology Building.

Metals in Biology
Number: CMB 800 Section 2
Credits: 2
Semester: Spring
Description: 'Metals in Biology' is intended for graduate students with backgrounds in biochemistry, molecular/cellular biology, microbiology, and/or chemistry. Taught in conjunction with MMG 803 and BMB 961 sec 001. (Please enroll thru the course and department which you would like to have on your transcript). In this course we will discuss the roles of metals in biological systems, including metalloenzymes, metallocenter biosynthesis, metal transport, metal toxicity, and metalloregulation. Discussions will focus on the catalytic mechanisms as well as the way in which the different protein environments 'tune' their active sites. Student presentations will be an important emphasis in this class.

LANDMARKS IN THE LITERATURE: SEMINAL PAPERS IN IMMUNOLOGY
Number: CMB 800 Section 2
Course Director: M. Petroff
Credits: 1
Semester: Fall
Description: This course explores fundamental questions in adaptive and innate immunology through both historical and contemporary scientific literature. Readings will include landmark papers that introduced seminal discoveries and drove paradigm shifts in the field. For each class session, students will work in groups to present assigned research articles, with each group member responsible for presenting a specific section of the paper.

FROM GAMETES TO GESTATION: SEMINAL PAPERS IN REPRODUCTIVE AND DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY
Number: CMB 800 Section 3
Course Director: M. Petroff
Credits: 1
Semester: Fall
Description: This course explores fundamental questions in reproductive and developmental biology through both historical and contemporary scientific literature. Readings will include landmark papers that introduced seminal discoveries and drove paradigm shifts in the field. For each class session, students will work in groups to present assigned research articles, with each group member responsible for presenting a specific section of the paper.

FRONTIERS IN EVOLUTIONARY DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY: FROM GENOTYPE TO PHENOTYPE
Number: IBIO 890
Course Director: Dr. Ingo Braasch, IBIO (braasch@msu.edu); Dr. Elizabeth Heath-Heckman, IBIO/MMG (each@msu.edu)
Credits: 1
Semester: Spring (please check course catalog)
Description: How do we get from DNA to diversity? How did Darwin’s “endless forms most beautiful” evolve? How did the snake loose its legs? How did insects obtain their wings? Do you want to understand the interrelations of evolution, development, and the environment? Then look no further, this seminar is for you! Evolutionary developmental biology or Evo-Devo investigates the development of organism from fertilized eggs via embryos to adults in a comparative framework to understand the evolution of developmental processes and how the genome instructs and evolves to generate a diverse set of organisms. With the recent explosion of multi-omic sequencing technologies and genome editing such as CRISPR, a menagerie of new model organisms is emerging that inform the developmental connections of genomes to phenomes, their evolution, and their response to environmental changes. In this seminar course, we will discuss recent advances in, unforeseen insights into, and tests of long-standing hypotheses about the evolution of developmental mechanism using examples from the research literature into a broad variety of topics. The course will specifically highlight the genomic foundations of animal Evo-Devo.

RESEARCH SEMINARS IN CANCER BIOLOGY
Number: PSL 950 Section 1
Course Director: E. Andrechek, K. Gallo
Credits: 1
Semester: Spring 2026
Description: This one credit seminar course will consist of cancer research seminars and on alternate weeks cancer-related journal article discussions/presentations. Each student will present one research seminar (30 min) and number of journal article presentations will depend on number of enrolled students. To enroll, please contact Kathy Gallo (gallok@msu.edu) or Eran Andrechek (andrech1@msu.edu) 

MECHANISMS OF ANIMAL HEALTH AND DISEASE
Number: VM 820
Course Director: C. Hegg
Credits: 2
Semester: Spring 2026 (Please contact instructor for more information)
Description: This course will use a journal article-based discussion format to provide a framework for understanding and interpreting knowledge relevant to biological and biomedical topics in comparative medicine, and familiarity with the experimental methods and research tools used in these areas. Mechanisms of pathogenesis will be covered in the areas of genetics and genomics, physiology, cell biology, oncology, neuroscience, pharmacology, host response mechanisms, and infectious disease. During the first half of class, the listed instructor will provide an overview (lecture/discussion) of the given topic. For the second half, a student will formally present/discuss an important paper(s) selected by the instructor on the topic. These papers will be posted in D2L. Each student will give at least one presentation. All students are expected to read and be prepared to discuss the selected research papers each week. In addition, all students not presenting will submit a summary of the selected paper that must be uploaded in D2L by 1 PM at the start of class. This summary should include background and context for the topic, summary of the results, strengths and weaknesses of the paper, possible future experiments and why this paper is important (how it opened up the field). These written assignments are intended to help the student condense material and present the most important information in a logical and compelling fashion.