Romanian Biotechnological Letters Vol. 14, No. 4, 2009, pp. 4567-4574 Copyright © 2008 Bucharest University Printed in Romania. All rights reserved Romanian Society of Biological Sciences ORIGINAL PAPER 4567 Teaching Molecular Biology using computational tools and tacking into account the learning styles of students Received for publication, November 20, 2008 Accepted, July 1, 2009 D. CRACIUN 1 , A. ISVORAN 2 1 West University of Timisoara, Teacher Training Department, Blvd. V. Parvan 4, Timisoara, 300223, Romania, E-mail: craciundana@gmail.com 2 West University of Timisoara, Department of Chemistry, Str. Pestalozzi 16, Timisoara, 300115, Romania, E-mail: aisvoran@yahoo.com Abstract A challenge in educating undergraduate and graduate students is to introduce them to the Internet, especially to visualization and molecular modeling software, and to teach them how to use these programs in their future research. This paper illustrates a few ways to use computer science for teaching and learning the modeling of biological molecules. The results demonstrate that effective use of molecular visualization can improve students understanding of protein structure and functions, independently of the modalities they use to acquire information. Using the molecular graphic programs, students obtain hands-on experiences to explore the structural aspects of macromolecular systems. All the applications are made for calcium binding proteins. The use of the Internet tools and of the molecular visualization software in biochemistry and molecular biophysics classroom, with their advantages and disadvantages, is discussed. Keywords: learning styles, active project-based learning, Internet, molecular biology education. Introduction Over the past decade an intense use of the Internet and educational software in high schools, colleges and universities has been noted. These methods are constantly developing, involving a considerable effort both for developers and users (or more experienced novices) [1]. For these reasons it is a real challenge to use visualization software and molecular modeling in student education [2]. There are several ways of using computers, we will refer to the online tools to teach and learn modeling and simulation, physicochemical parameters calculation and prediction of structures and functions of the biological molecules [3, 4]. The first items on biological molecules structure are taught in the course of Biochemistry and some of the students are familiar with the computational tool for visualization and investigation of protein structure. Since these programs include many tools, they can be used later in the master cycle for studying molecular mechanics and molecular dynamics of biological macromolecules and/or of their complexes. All these online programs, used properly and responsible, can lead to great results for students, improving the understanding level of the student related to biological molecules structures and functions [5]. It also offers a powerful tool which leads to addressing the problems by using the scientific research method. Knowing the different learning styles, the question to be answered within this study is how the educational process can be improved, in particular with reference to the course of “Molecular basis of therapeutics action” uniting in an efficient way the learning style, the active methods and the Internet-based programs free available online. During the applicative activities for this course, the active learning based on projects is used. The students are