Biological organisms provide an unparalleled palette for almost every color and pattern imaginable. Why do organisms have stripes and spots? Why blue or red? When is a spiral just a spiral? This course will explore how and why various colors and patterns are produced in the biological and natural world. We will investigate underlying mechanisms (biochemical, genetic and epigenetic, developmental) and external influences (environmental mechanisms, natural selection), as well as simple mathematical models, to explain their production.

This seminar is a required course for Commonwealth Honors College students where students participate in a topical seminar-style course designed by its instructor. While the subject matter of each section is different, advanced knowledge of the topic is not required. While the subject matter of each section is different, the requirements for each section are the same.

In this course, we will examine the particularities of refugees, internally displaced people (IDPs), stateless people and the changing nature of forced migration since the WWII. This course will investigate the nature, causes, and consequences of contemporary forced migration waves with specific attention to the cases from the Middle East. The Middle East remains to be a major source of refugees while hosting a vast majority of them. According to the UNHCR, Syria together with Afghanistan and South Sudan is the largest source of refugees.

In this course we will develop an understanding of scientific inquiry and its methods as a human activity, inextricably linked to the cultural context in which it unfolds. By examining some of the major scientific revolutions in physics, we will ask: What kinds of truths do the sciences produce and how? What is the role of data and technology in the making of scientific progress? What is the interaction between the sciences and other aspects of culture, such as politics, religion, and the arts? What kind of a person is a scientist and how does that depend on the time and place?

What are space and time? This course will follow the evolution of the scientific understanding of these concepts which are so fundamental to our experience of the world and of ourselves. Our journey will trace the intellectual paths of physicists who grappled with these questions, including Newton and Einstein, taking us from the conceptions of space and time familiar from our daily experiences to the modern understanding of four-dimensional spacetime as described by the special theory of relativity.

In this course we follow the "biographies" of several major illicit drugs in order to uncover global histories of capitalism and foreign policy in the modern world. Our readings will take us around the world, but we will ultimately be rooted in the United States. We begin with histories of opium in the 19th century, when revenues from its sale were critical to imperial expansion in Asia. We then consider the global movement to regulate and prohibit drugs in the 20th century, building on case studies of opium in the Philippines, marijuana in Mexico, and cocaine in Peru.