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NS-379B7.5 ECTSQ2EnglishBachelor

Biological and Soft Matter Physics

FaculteitFaculty of Science
NiveauBachelor
Studiejaar2026-2027

Beschrijving

Course goals

Learning goals:
  1. Become familiar with the central dogma of molecular biology and cellular components
  2. Apply statistical physics to biological systems
  3. Employ elasticity theory to model biological membranes and anisotropic systems
  4. Use nonlinear dynamics to analyze the global properties of a biological system
  5. Build a model of populations from individual growth processes/behaviors
  6. Learn how to communicate about current scientific research

Content

In this course, we will survey biological physics and soft matter – progressing from small to large scales and from equilibrium to out-of-equilibrium phenomena. Living systems leverage a wide-range of physical processes for their function. To demonstrate this, we will center our lectures around bacteria as our model system, moving from small-scale biomolecules to large-scale populations.

A summary of content to be covered is as follows:
 
  • Brief review of biological concepts, including the central dogma and cellular components
  • Models for polymers/biological molecules, elasticity (1D)
  • Interfacial phenomena/lipid assembly
  • Elasticity of membranes (2D)
  • Biological liquid crystals, elasticity theory for liquid crystals (3D), topological defects
  • Gene regulation
  • Bacterial chemotaxis
  • Bacterial population dynamics (Luria-Delbrück)
  • With guest lectures from biophysicists from the physics and biology departments

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