Spring 2027

Biochemical Methods

Biochemical Methods introduces modern biochemical laboratory techniques and literature, featuring student seminar presentations that parallel lab experiments.

offering recorded4 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Rae BrownVatsan Raman

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Lynne Prost

One student found the lectures and exams easy, though they described the lab component as difficult and annoying, with presentations accounting for 15% of the grade.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Discuss the theory of several fundamental biochemical techniques that form hypotheses based on biochemical principles

  • Form hypotheses based on biochemical principles

  • Design and perform experiments to address a hypothesis

  • Collect sound scientific data

  • Critically analyze one’s own data as well as data from other sources

  • Communicate scientific theory and findings in both oral and written form

  • Evaluate the importance of collaboration in biochemistry research

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

BIOCHEM 501, 507, or concurrent enrollment

BIOCHEM 551

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027

No course-specific feedback yet.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.83 GPA, 91.1% A/AB (n=90 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.73 GPA, 89.5% A/AB (n=95 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.85 GPA, 96.6% A/AB (n=117 letter grades). Includes jointly taught sections.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

LYNNE PROST is recorded teaching in Spring 2016, Fall 2016, Spring 2017, Spring 2018, Fall 2018, Spring 2019, Fall 2019, Spring 2020, Fall 2020. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

SRIVATSAN RAMAN is recorded teaching in Spring 2017, Spring 2018, Spring 2019, Spring 2022, Spring 2023, Spring 2024, Spring 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 960
LAB 301Classroom Instruction0 / 220
LAB 302Classroom Instruction0 / 220
LAB 303Classroom Instruction0 / 220
LAB 304Classroom Instruction0 / 220

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Lynne Prost

The course introduced students to basic bench science and common molecular biology techniques, supported by lectures that provided shallow biochemistry underpinning the lab work.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2025: 3.73 GPA, 89.5% A/AB (n=95 letter grades); Fall 2025: 3.78 GPA, 93.6% A/AB (n=78 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.85 GPA, 96.6% A/AB (n=117 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Lynne Prost

One student found the lectures and exams easy, though they described the lab component as difficult and annoying, with presentations accounting for 15% of the grade.

Past student reviews · Lynne Prost

A student reported that the instructor zoomed through lectures quickly, leaving no time to take notes, and that grading criteria for lab reports were unclear.

Topics

  • Modern biochemical laboratory techniques
  • Current biochemical literature
  • Hypothesis formation based on biochemical principles

Skills

  • Discussing the theory of fundamental biochemical techniques
  • Designing and performing experiments
  • Critically analyzing scientific data
  • Communicating scientific findings orally and in writing

Grades

Historical instructor

Spring 2027 · Projected

Before grades are released

– average GPA

Approximate 80% prediction interval

About this estimate

The course’s semester-average GPA, not an individual student’s grade. The center uses 5 same-season terms, weighted toward recent results.

The range uses the finite-sample 80th-percentile rank of absolute errors from earlier same-season forecasts. Each forecast uses only records from earlier terms. At least four forecasts are required; bounds are rounded outward and limited to 0–4. This is an empirical estimate: changing instructors or grading policies can reduce its coverage.

8 earlier forecasts · 0.14 GPA average error.

Grades over time

Through Spring 2027

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records
BIOCHEM 551 · Spring 2027

Biochemical Methods

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:200:001864",
    "course_id": "BIOCHEM 551",
    "course_uid": "course_378f2210954f5e9404bcb8cb",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "001864",
    "source_subject_id": "200",
    "title": "Biochemical Methods",
    "credits_min": 4,
    "credits_max": 4,
    "typically_offered": "Fall, Spring"
  }
]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "c2c7562dfe6871908ab1eed35175b0a7bb05ae54c9857b27cb2f43f573cdc7f4",
  "requirements_status": "needs_review",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}