Welcome to MBB 463 Forensic Genomics!

Instructor: Dr. Sophie Sneddon (sophie_sneddon@sfu.ca) SSB 7157

TA: Karar Al-Mamaar (karar_al-mamaar@sfu.ca)

Class times: Wednesday & Friday 2.30 - 4.20 pm SWH 10041

Class delivery: In person. Lectures will be recorded. Lecture recordings

Class info: A focus on the molecular and genomic biology associated with forensic science, including genome structure, genotyping, genetic analysis of DNA fingerprints, DNA data bases and CODIS, Y STRs, mtDNA and ethical considerations of DNA typing.

Class Schedule

Lecture Notes | Course readings (optional) | Kahoots quizzes

Grading

Exams

• Midterm 1 (25%): Wednesday June 17 - covers lectures 1-9

• Midterm 2 (25%): Friday July 24 - covers lectures 11-18

Assignments

• Group project (15%): group project that includes both an oral presentation with peer review/discussion, and an accompanying written assessment

• Individual report (25%)

• Participation (10%)

Course Policies

Attendance Policy

Students are expected to attend all lectures and complete all course requirements to receive credit in this course. Students must have a valid, verifiable excuse to miss an exam. If you anticipate a conflict with any of the scheduled exams, contact your instructor immediately. If you are affected by illness or extenuating circumstances during the course of the semester that may interfere with your ability to submit an assignment or sit an exam, you must let the instructor know as soon as possible so that accommodations can be made. Absences for the final exam will only be accepted in the case of illness or emergencies. Documentation must be provided and must be verifiable. If your absence is excused, the make up exam will be held on Welcome Day of the next semester. There will be no other chances to sit the exam.

Lecture Recordings

Lectures are scheduled for recording and will be posted to the recording channel page listed in the Course Information section of the Modules page on Canvas. Please note that lecture recordings are not guaranteed and in some instances may not record due to technical issues. Recordings are intended for use as study resources and are in no way intended to substitute for attending class.

Assignment Submission Policy

You will be required to submit assignments to Canvas throughout the semester. PDF files are preferred. It is your responsibility to ensure that your files are not corrupted and can be opened by the instructor. If your file cannot be opened, it will not be graded and a zero will be entered into the gradebook. Your instructor will not follow up for a resubmission. Any resubmissions will be subject to the late policy (see below).

Late Policy

A late penalty of 10% per day will be applied on all work for a total of 5 days, after which a submission will not be accepted and a zero grade will be entered into the gradebook.

Midterm Review and Grading Challenge Policies

You must review your midterm within 7 days following the release of the papers on Crowdmark. Grading challenges will not be heard until 24 hours after the papers have been released on Crowdmark. Any grading challenges must be made within this period. No grading appeals will be considered after the 7 day period. Grading appeals will not be heard at the end of the semester. Any grading appeals must be made to the TA first and if you cannot come to a resolution it can be escalated to the instructor. If the instructor agrees to review your midterm, the entire midterm may be regraded which could lead to a loss of marks. Grades will only be adjusted if and only if there have been errors made in the grading process.

Final Grading Policies

Final grades are final. There are no standard grading scales. Grading policies will be explained in the first lecture. Grades will be rounded up if you fall within 0.1% of the cutoff. Do not ask to be rounded - if you can be, you have been. Emails asking for rounding or increasing of grades will be ignored. Grades will only be adjusted if and only if there have been errors made in the grading process and will be adjusted for ALL students if such an error is identified.

Academic Integrity

You are expected to have read and agreed to abide by the SFU Academic Integrity policies (https://www.sfu.ca/policies/gazette/student.html). Plagiarism can include turning in another person’s work as your own, turning in your own previously submitted work from another course, allowing another person to turn in work that you have produced, copying and pasting from an online source including websites, lecture notes, etc. This is not an exhaustive list.

Responsible Use of LLMs (ChatGPT, Gemini, etc)

LLMs have become commonplace within the academic setting, but the onus is on the student to not use LLMs to create work for submission for this course. There are several ways in which you can responsibly use LLMs to augment your existing study habits:

• Creating study guides from course content

• Brainstorming ideas

• Testing you on course material

Understand that LLMs are largely fancy predictive text machines and don't have any actual knowledge on the material they produce. I have worked extensively in understanding the capabilities of LLMs, and note the high rate of error in their answers, as well as completely made up "facts." If a student submits work that indicates possible LLM usage, they will be subject to an oral examination on the submitted work in order to receive a grade. Failure to pass the oral examination will lead to a zero for that assignment on the first offence and any subsequent event will lead to the filing of an academic dishonesty report and potentially failure of the course.