Teaching Lipids and Membranes in the Classroom and Laboratory

Cellular membranes harbor receptors, ion channels, lipid domains, lipid signals, and scaffolding complexes, which function to maintain cellular growth, metabolism, and homeostasis. Moreover, abnormalities in lipid metabolism attributed to genetic changes among other causes are often associated with diseases such as cancer. Thus, there is a need to comprehensively understand molecular events occurring within and on membranes as a means of grasping disease etiology and identifying viable targets for drug development. The lipid bilayer has a highly polarized structure that consists of a central hydrocarbon core and two flanking interfacial regions that are highly dynamic and may contain >10,000 different lipids. This dynamic variety of glycerolipids, sphingolipids, and sterols in the membrane organelles provide spatial and temporal architecture to direct signaling processes through target proteins. The central lipid bilayer viewed as a hub for biological interactions can serve an integral role in biochemistry education. To increase what has traditionally been an underserved area of biochemical education, we have designed a lipid‐based curriculum for the undergraduate and graduate classrooms and laboratories. An overview of the curriculum and laboratory experiments will be given.