Keeping abreast
of knowledge can be a tremendous task for science teachers, but Brian
Dempsey of Acton-Boxborough Regional High School in Acton,
Massachusetts has succeeded by taking advantage of a Research
Experiences for Teachers (RET) activity sponsored by the National
Science Foundation (NSF). RET supplements allow K-12
teachers to perform research with an NSF-funded scientist for a
summer, with the goal of ultimately involving their students in a
research-based curriculum.
Dempsey
worked with David Hibbett and Manfred Binder from Clark University in
Worcester, Mass., on their grant to study the evolutionary
relationships of a group of mushrooms named the Boletales. Dempsey
was included in the research activities of this project, from
collecting and identifying mushrooms during field trips to extracting
and purifying DNA to estimate evolutionary relationships among the
mushrooms. Dempsey’s experience even included attending the
Mycological Society of America meeting and preparing two manuscripts
for publication in peer-reviewed journals. One manuscript is
about his RET experience, while the other focuses on his research
findings from that summer.
Over
the course of his summer research, Dempsey's work showed that two
species of Boletales mushrooms had been regularly misidentified as
separate species, when in fact they were the same--common New England
forest mushroom, Boletus longicurvipes. The appearance
of these mushrooms had deceived past scientists and the DNA sequences
that Dempsey generated and analyzed revealed their true identity.
In
his classroom, Dempsey has employed a fungal molecular ecology
learning module that he and Hibbett developed. The module uses
DNA sequences already generated by Hibbett’s lab to identify fungi,
but the RET experience has inspired Dempsey to compete for a grant to
acquire molecular biology equipment for his high school, so he can
involve students in research in the hopes of piquing their interest
and enthusiasm for biology.
Partner:
Acton-Boxborough Regional High School
More Photos:
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Teacher,
Brian Dempsey, collecting mushrooms.
Credit: Manfred Binder, Summer 2006
Permission Granted
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