Development and Implementation of a Short “Mini-CURE” Focused On Apoptosis In Cultured Cells

Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) are a high-impact, evidence-based strategy to incorporate genuine research experiences into undergraduate courses. Many published CUREs are designed as stand-alone lab courses, or as semester-long experiences that take the place of most or all traditional “cookbook” or shorter inquiry-based lab activities in the lab associated with a course. As an alternative, shorter “mini-CURE” experiences may be designed that involve less than half of the semester for a particular course. This approach may allow a balance between the goal of extending research experiences to many students, and the benefits that may come from retaining some more structured lab activities that explicitly reinforce concepts covered in the course. In addition, a mini-CURE may be less resource-intensive and thus more feasible at institutions where budget is a major limiting factor. Missouri Western State University is an open-access, regional primarily undergraduate institution. In an upper-division pathophysiology course for biology majors, a mini-CURE was designed that centered on analysis of apoptosis in cultured mammalian cells. This project was inspired by a 4-week inquiry-based module on apoptosis published by DiBartolomies & Mone ( CBE: Life Sciences Education, 2003). The 14-week semester was divided into three blocks of 4-5 weeks. The first block focused on histology, histopathology, and immunohistochemistry. The second block focused on mammalian cell culture techniques, and assays for apoptosis that involved fluorescence microscopy, a colorimetric plate reader, or electrophoresis equipment (such as nuclear staining with DAPI or propidium iodide, a plate-based phospho-p53 assay, western blot for cleavage of PARP (a caspase substrate), and/or a fluorescence-based caspase activity assay. Students also spent time during this block doing research and generating an experimental plan to test a chemical or physical agent of their choice for its ability induce or inhibit apoptosis in cultured cells. In the third block, students worked in groups of 3-4 to conduct their experiments, analyze the data, and prepare a poster for presentation at our on-campus research symposium. Students had sufficient time to repeat at least one experiment, providing some opportunity for troubleshooting and iteration, one of the elements of a CURE. In a survey (approved by the MWSU IRB) of the most recent course offering, 100% of students (9/9 respondents) agreed that they learned a lot from the project, and 7 out of 9 (78%) agreed with the statement “I get personal satisfaction from finding out the answer to an experimental question by myself or with a small group.” In response to an open question about what went well with the group research project, common themes included collaboration, reinforcing and extending the techniques learned, and gaining knowledge. In conclusion, a shortened “mini-CURE” may yield some similar outcomes for students as a full-semester CURE, but with reduced resource and lab time requirements. This abstract was presented at the American Physiology Summit 2025 and is only available in HTML format. There is no downloadable file or PDF version. The Physiology editorial board was not involved in the peer review process.