This film tells the story of how DNA sequencing was used to identify the gene BRAF. Clinical researcher Ultan McDermott tells the story of how scientists at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute discovered a specific mutation in the BRAF gene, which is found in around half of malignant melanoma cases. He...

This play allows children to explore biodiversity through movement and music in a fun and engaging way.  It looks at how consumer demand drives the growing of a particular type of rice in India and the consequences if a disease or pest affects the growth of rice crops.

Great for use in an assembly or in...

In this resource, students use their STEM skills to help them design and build a model of a flood- proof house. Activities to help them with their design include testing materials (for strength and absorbency) and structures. Set on a fictitious island coping with the devastating effects of flooding caused by...

These activities have been developed for the National HE STEM Programme to be used in conjunction with the video resources found in this collection.

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This play looks at how an increase in the demand for meat can affect tropical rainforests far away. It explores some of the consequences for; animals and plants living in these areas, farmers and our planet.  

Great for use in an assembly or in class, when learning about rainforests, healthy eating and...

This resource introduces binary data to students via the creation of bracelets which display their name in binary. This lesson helps to demonstrate how it is possible to take something that we know and translate it into a series of ons and offs (ones or zeroes). The resource contains a lesson plan and related...

These resources can be used as a context to look at 14-16 and post-16 biology curriculum areas of:

• vision and the eye

• structure and function of the retina

• development and use of biomaterials

• tissue transplants and stem cells in the treatment of human disorders

• working...

This resource looks at how biomimicry enables engineers to take ideas from the natural world to develop new products and designs. The specific example of gecko tape is used to illustrate this. Students play a game of pairs where they need to match technology with the animal or plant which inspired its development....

This video shows Angelo Grubisic, an aerospace engineer who combines his love of wingsuit BASE jumping with his engineering knowledge to develop the world's most scientifically engineered wingsuit.

In this module students will study barnacle morphology, life histories and life styles as Darwin did. He based his classification and search for a common ancestor upon his studies. Recent work using genetic and molecular evidence and scanning electron microscopy shows how some of the key difficulties in drawing the...

This resource describes the use of Cabomba to investigate the effect of light intensity in photosynthesis. The video demonstrates how best to use this protocol with students in the lab, supported by student sheets with four different investigations, technical notes and...

This activity asks students to consider the biology of cancer, and to use the information they research to produce a document summarising their main points. Dr Eleanor Stride is developing a treatment for cancer that encloses cancer treating drugs in bubbles that can be directed by magnetic fields to the cancer...

Produced by the Wellcome Trust, this issue of the Big Picture explores some of the careers that are available to students who have studied biological science. It goes...