SimBiotic software short-shots

Abstract

SimBiotic Software is a small US company that produces interactive computer simulations for teaching biology. Our programs allow students to ‘discover’ important principles and concepts by doing experiments using simulations of realistic biological scenarios. In 1997, UniServe published a review of EcoBeaker 1.0 ™, our flagship software for teaching ecology (Montgomery, 1997). The enthusiasm for and popularity of the EcoBeaker software over the past several years encouraged us to develop innovations to make our software more widely accessible, and to branch out and apply our approaches to other areas of biology. UniServe Science has invited us to introduce some of our new projects here. We now have an improved version of EcoBeaker, and other new teaching software on topics such as diffusion and osmosis teaching (OsmoBeaker), evolution (EvoBeaker), neurobiology (NerveWorks), and are working on methods for online delivery of labs and assessment of student learning.