Isolation, Culture Procedures and Microscopy of the Mouse Peritoneal Cells for Assaying Phagocytosis: An Undergraduate Laboratory Experiment

Abstract To investigate phagocytosis, a class of undergraduate students isolated, cultured and fixed the mouse peritoneal cells. We concluded that the mouse immune system has high efficiency to eliminate pathogens. Educational research has shown many advantages of using “hands-on” experiments which will help students carry out different experimental techniques and ultimately gain laboratory research skills. Skills that include preparing tissue culture media, handling animals and cell culture techniques, staining, and utilizing microscopes, will develop the knowledge needed to work in a laboratory, to produce a plan to undertake and test scientific hypotheses, and to emphasize future employability skills and attitudes. Key words: Active-learning strategies, peritoneal cells,phagocytosis, microscopy, mouse Introduction Many science education reports have shown that traditional lectures accompanied with “ready recipe” labs do not serve the needs of the student during his/her educational development (Smith et al., 2005; Wood, 2003). Therefore, active-learning strategies, also known as seeking new information, are very important to teach Biology as a discipline to undergraduate students. These strategies can mainly be present in the laboratory work in which the students are highly engaged in practical experiments, rather than having an instructor as the center of the class to run the “show”. Such laboratory practices or classes provide great opportunities to students to handle different “wethand” procedures. This increases the students understanding and makes them rely on the evidence rather than theoretical knowledge. To illustrate, it clarifies/explains an observed event through connecting their theoretical knowledge with the practical skills (Bendassolli,2013).