I loved Virology I, the first class in this two-part series by Vincent Racaniello of Columbia University. Virology II, How Viruses Cause Disease, is a 12-week course. This post contains my notes from the course. (The Week 1 notes are omitted.)

Futurelearn.com is a MOOC with primarily UK universities. I signed up for several Futurelearn courses, and Inside Cancer is the first. The first week of this six-week course was too basic for me, but I will probably take the remaining six weeks because I think the material will be more advanced. This post contains my notes and test scores.

I decided to take Drugs and the Brain, my third Coursera class, late last year when I saw it in the list of offerings. The 7-week course by Henry Lester of the California Institute of Technology began on January 5. 

Week 1
Videos 1 and 2 provide an overview of the course.

Video 3, What is a drug, presents information about nicotine, lidocaine, morphine, and botulinum toxin as examples of drugs. In the context of the brain, drugs:

1. Activate (e.g., nicotine) and block (lidocaine) ion channels.
2. Act on G-protein coupled receptor pathways (e.g., morphine).
3. Activate genes (e.g., nicotine, morphine).
4. Protein drugs (e.g., botulinum toxin) may become more useful for neuroscience diseases.
5. Act on neurotransmitter transporters.