Tuesday, January 22, 2002

A CD-ROM Course Teaches Cat Enthusiasts About the Genetic Makeup of Their Pets By BROCK READ Cornell University created its distance-learning course in feline genetics in response to an age-old rivalry -- the competition between cat lovers and dog lovers. After the university developed a class in canine genetics, Feline Genetics Institution: Cornell University Instructor: Elizabeth A. Oltenacu, an associate professor of animal science When offered: Winter and summer sessions Enrollment: Twenty-five to thirty students Cost: $375 URL: Information about the course is available here. says Elizabeth A. Oltenacu, an associate professor of animal science, "we started getting feedback from cat owners saying, 'What about us cat people?'" Ms. Oltenacu is the head instructor of "Feline Genetics," a not-for-credit course open to all cat enthusiasts. The class combines elements of an introductory course in animal genetics with specific information on determining cats' coat color, predicting diseases, and understanding recent research. The bulk of the course material comes in a CD-ROM shipped to all students enrolled in the class. The disk features a set of eight multimedia lectures composed of Microsoft PowerPoint presentations and accompanying sound files. Students review about one lecture a week, and they also examine auxiliary material, including a glossary of useful terms and audio files from a symposium on feline-genetics research that the university held in 2000. Every other lecture comes with a "lab exercise" composed of problems that students work through and send via e-mail to the course's teaching assistants for grading. The assignments are posted on the class Web site, where students can also obtain transcripts of all the lectures that are on the CD-ROM. The Web site also includes a threaded discussion board on which Ms. Oltenacu fields questions, often on issues that are not otherwise incorporated into the course. Most of the students in the class breed cats, she says, and "some of them start the class with burning questions" drawn from their own experiences. The interests of breeders and researchers often do not jibe, according to Ms. Oltenacu. Scientists are studying cat genomes extensively, she says, but their research usually focuses on the characteristics of feline diseases. Breeders, on the other hand, are interested in aesthetic concerns: For instance, Ms. Oltenacu says, students have asked how to determine whether newborn Bengal cats would be marked with stripes or with leopard-like spots. Ms. Oltenacu uses resources from the university's animal-science department and its Feline Health Center to answer questions whenever possible, but some aspects of feline genetics remain mysterious. Students are encouraged to speculate on the implications of their breeding experiments, and "two-way discussions" often ensue. "I find I'm learning a lot from the discussion board," Ms. Oltenacu says. The third installment of the course -- which is taught every winter and summer -- began this month. Ms. Oltenacu estimates that an average session has 25 to 30 students, from the United States and abroad. Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

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