Biochemistry lab: required, useful?

[philosonista]

Hi, all --

So the new MCAT is out with biochem as a subject. Two questions.

First, have the pre-requesites changed such that you have to take the lab with the lecture of Biochem? I've only looked at Yale's website specifically to find the lab is "not required, but recommended," so I was wondering if ya'll had a general idea of this.

Second, how useful have you all found the lab, if you've taken it? Is it a time suck, or is it genuinely useful for understanding the material? I can't say labs have done much beyond sucking up my time in my experience.

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[Pusheen]

Eh, it's ok. I probably wouldn't take it unless I had to for my major. It's a lot of protein purification. While the concepts are fairly interesting and engaging, the experiments themselves take forever (9+ hours for one).

If you thoroughly understand the concepts from Biochem I, then you don't really "need" the lab

 

[Furan]

Some schools are requiring it now, but having taken both the lecture and lab I kind of regret both. I did well in each but in hindsight I would have just listed them as "planned courses" and went ahead and taken them if I got accepted to a school that required them. In my experience they were more trouble than they were worth.

 

[NeuResurgens]

I haven't heard of any schools who require biochem lab. It's only useful if it interests you or if you might do biomedical research, I would say.

 

[allanMED15]

Hi, all --

So the new MCAT is out with biochem as a subject. Two questions.

First, have the pre-requesites changes such that you have to take the lab with the lecture of Biochem? I've only looked at Yale's website specifically to find the lab is "not required, but recommended," so I was wondering if ya'll had a general idea of this.

Second, how useful have you all found the lab, if you've taken it? Is it a time suck, or is it genuinely useful for understanding the material? I can't say labs have done much beyond sucking up my time in my experience.

I am pretty sure that some schools do require the lab. Hopkins for example does. I only know that because I am a grad student here right now. Certainly MSAR has all of that info.

 

[Furan]

I haven't heard of any schools who require biochem lab. It's only useful if it interests you or if you might do biomedical research, I would say.

There's quite a few actually. Most schools won't state it explicitly, but they require 4 hours of Biochem so you do the math.

 

[philosonista]

I am pretty sure that some schools do require the lab. Hopkins for example does. I only know that because I am a grad student here right now. Certainly MSAR has all of that info.

Coming straight from the Hopkins website:

3. Biochemistry. Three or 4 semester hours are required. Lab is not required.

 

[allanMED15]

Coming straight from the Hopkins website:

3. Biochemistry. Three or 4 semester hours are required. Lab is not required.

Hmm. That's news to me. But alright.

 

[NeuResurgens]

Heck, some schools are only requiring one semester of orgo.. I think it'd be kind of absurd to require a biochem lab.

 

[philosonista]

There's quite a few actually. Most schools won't state it explicitly, but they require 4 hours of Biochem so you do the math.

I just looked at the requirements of n = 20 schools: NY public schools and all the big names and a few other random ones. None of them required biochem lab. If they required any biochem, it was either specified that the lab was not needed or that you needed 3-4 credits of Biochem. Harvard came right out and said labs are an inefficient use of time that should be used more wisely! Ha!

I'm not going to go through all the med schools, but I'd generally say it's not required.

 

[moemoekyun]

Apologies for rant, I have some things I want to say.

For the first question, I'm not too sure. The schools I want to apply to, like UF, for the most part, recommend it, but don't require it.

For the second question, imo, depends on the structure of your school's lab course. In my experience, the biochem lab I took was the BIGGEST waste of time/most frustrating course of my undergraduate (only took lab because professor was a good friend and I thought it would be easy since I TA'd a baby biochemistry lab). We had 15 people sharing 3 spectrophotometers (the other lab had 24), and most students were forensics majors who gave no f__k's about the lab, so protein samples denatured, buffers weren't prepared right, gels fell apart. The best was when I had to stay from 1pm to 11pm to finish a lab cause everyone else had to get home.

I'm not saying to not take the lab (I got an A at least), if the lab is structured well, good equipment, and you like biochemistry (not that my lab had much to do with biochemistry lecture, only 2 chapters from the voet book was pretty much covered)/want to go into biochemistry research, and have time, I'd say go for it. Material imo is interesting, and I remember a handful of questions on the old mcat had biochem lab questions (not that they expected you to know what SDS-PAGE is, but the background definitely helped).

 

[Pusheen]

Apologies for rant, I have some things I want to say.

For the first question, I'm not too sure. The schools I want to apply to, like UF, for the most part, recommend it, but don't require it.

For the second question, imo, depends on the structure of your school's lab course. In my experience, the biochem lab I took was the BIGGEST waste of time/most frustrating course of my undergraduate (only took lab because professor was a good friend and I thought it would be easy since I TA'd a baby biochemistry lab). We had 15 people sharing 3 spectrophotometers (the other lab had 24), and most students were forensics majors who gave no f__k's about the lab, so protein samples denatured, buffers weren't prepared right, gels fell apart. The best was when I had to stay from 1pm to 11pm to finish a lab cause everyone else had to get home.

I'm not saying to not take the lab (I got an A at least), if the lab is structured well, good equipment, and you like biochemistry (not that my lab had much to do with biochemistry lecture, only 2 chapters from the voet book was pretty much covered)/want to go into biochemistry research, and have time, I'd say go for it. Material imo is interesting, and I remember a handful of questions on the old mcat had biochem lab questions (not that they expected you to know what SDS-PAGE is, but the background definitely helped).

Haha, I had a similar experience. Stayed 2pm-11pm one day too. Def my most frustrating lab so far...but then I have achem coming up next semester so that may change

 

[sovereign0]

I'll actually go against the grain and say that Biochemistry Lab is a pretty useful course. Obviously it varies depending on the structure of your school's course, but in my biochem lab I learned DNA extractions, bacterial transformations, SDS PAGE/Western Blot Gels, ELISA, protein quantification and activity assays, restriction enzyme digests, PCR... all sorts of techniques with direct applications to medicine and biomedical research. When I started in my new research lab, I didn't need training aside from familiarization with some of the software.

EDIT: The class was required for my major, but I didn't regret taking it one bit.

 

[medic86]

Meh.

It's asinine to require biochem lab, imo. *shrugs*

 

[darkeon]

Only school in my state that "prefers lab component taken" with bioChem strangely enough does so for its physician assistant program.

 

[dextertrip]

I feel like the lab would help with the MCAT more than any lecture would. Most of the MCAT is just reviewing experiments, and it wasn't able to put BCH into context until the lab. I'd take it if you have the option and it won't kill you. Especially if you want to go to a med school that requires an applied project so your less limited by starting what you're familiar with.

 

[moemoekyun]

Haha, I had a similar experience. Stayed 2pm-11pm one day too. Def my most frustrating lab so far...but then I have achem coming up next semester so that may change

Analytical? I took that lab too. It wasn't as bad, but we were graded on accuracy (40% of report), so I got a B. Oh well.

I'll actually go against the grain and say that Biochemistry Lab is a pretty useful course. Obviously it varies depending on the structure of your school's course, but in my biochem lab I learned DNA extractions, bacterial transformations, SDS PAGE/Western Blot Gels, ELISA, protein quantification and activity assays, restriction enzyme digests, PCR... all sorts of techniques with direct applications to medicine and biomedical research. When I started in my new research lab, I didn't need training aside from familiarization with some of the software.

EDIT: The class was required for my major, but I didn't regret taking it one bit.

My lab only did protein purification and analysis. Funny enough that other nonbiochem labs like one I TA'd for actually did do DNA stuff.

I feel like the lab would help with the MCAT more than any lecture would. Most of the MCAT is just reviewing experiments, and it wasn't able to put BCH into context until the lab. I'd take it if you have the option and it won't kill you. Especially if you want to go to a med school that requires an applied project so your less limited by starting what you're familiar with.

Agree with this. I would say any involvement in labs, research, and research literature was what prepared me best for the old MCAT (at least PS and BS).

 

[Tintinnabula]

My lab only did protein purification and analysis. Funny enough that other nonbiochem labs like one I TA'd for actually did do DNA stuff.

This was my experience. Biochem lab did some protein purification but were largely amino acid titration labs. My advanced microbiology and genetics labs were the ones where we did protein extraction, ELISA, PCR, etc.