JoinAll Case Studies
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Suggested Keywords, to help with your search (besides selecting subjects): clicker cases, directed cases, interrupted cases, discussion cases, intimate debate cases. As a reminder, all cases may be adjusted to meet the needs of your student level. See our case use guidelines.
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By Miriam Segura-Totten
The goal of this case study is to expose students to the basics of embryonic stem cells, their therapeutic uses, and the controversy surrounding embryonic stem cells through the story of a college student, Jim Allison, who becomes paralyzed after a c...
The Soccer Mom: Hebrew Translation
By Jennifer Bolognese, Misti Coronel, Anita Intorre, Philip J. Stephens
In this case study, translated from the original English into Hebrew, students read and interpret the signs and symptoms of a woman suffering from a neurological disorder and make a diagnosis. The case was developed for use in a one-semester animal p...
By Giselle A. McCallum, Annie Prud’homme-Genereux
This case study uses the example of ionic foot baths to examine how placebo treatments can affect our health and wellness. Inspired by a student’s real visit to a spa, the story begins with a description of the experience of an ionic foot bath, and...
Global Climate Change: What Does it Look Like?
By Ronald L. Carnell, Rebecca M. Price
In this interrupted case study, Ph.D.-paleoclimatologist-turned-TV-meteorologist Sara Fahrenheit finds herself projected into a future climate that reminds her of the Early Eocene: it's hot, it's humid, and seems tropical. The story is a vehicle for ...
I've Fallen Over and I Can't Get Up
By Ashley L. Madern, Michael D. Hood, Jeffrey C. Paul, Jr., Philip J. Stephens
Greg Myron is playing the last football game of his career as the high school’s star running back. As the clock counts down the final seconds, Greg rushes 70 yards down field until he is tackled out of bounds. When the kicking team comes out to try...
By David F. Dean (rr)
The pancreas is the source of the bulk of digestive enzymes that act upon the contents of the small intestine. The normal function of the pancreas can be studied in the context of acute pancreatitis, an inflammatory disease with a sudden onset. In th...
By Keith K. Schillo
This case is designed to help students develop a deeper understanding of negative feedback regulation. Basic principles of negative feedback systems are illustrated by focusing on the effects of anabolic steroids on the hypothalamic-pituitary-testicu...
A Social-Cognitive Exploration of Reactions to Leiby Kletzky's Abduction and Homicide
By Jamie G. McMinn, Dana S. Dunn
An eight-year-old boy, abducted while walking home from day camp, is killed and dismembered, and his alleged murderer, a member of the boy's community, is arrested. Students read details about the case with the goal of exploring how people have respo...
Newsflash! Transport Proteins on Strike!
By Dianne W. York
This role-play case study teaches students about plasma membrane transport and the functions of transport proteins in the phospholipid bilayer. Students act out the parts of molecules and structures in a fantastical cellular world where the unionized...
By Lynn Diener
This case study explores some of the health issues brought to light during the flooding in New Orleans caused by Hurricane Katrina. The case encourages students to think about a variety of problems that can occur when humans are exposed to unsanitary...
An Unusual Case of Animal Reproduction
By Joann B. Powell, Elethia W. Tillman
This case study in human reproduction follows Andrea, a college biology student who discovers she is pregnant with twins, but is not sure who the father is. Students are presented with a variety of signs, symptoms, and physiological information that ...
By Luanna B. Prevost, Paula P. Lemons
The format for this case is unusual. The PowerPoint of the "case" provides an in-class framework for working through all of the activities associated with the case. These activities are explained in the teaching notes. The teaching ...
Chickens and Humans and Pigs, Oh My!
By Jeffrey J. Byrd, Samantha L. Elliott
Influenza is a common topic in the popular press and a point of interest for many students. This case study was written to promote interdisciplinary connections between upper division virology and immunology classes. Students that partici...
Lost in the Desert! Hebrew Translation
By David L. Evans
In this directed case study, translated from the original English into Hebrew, students read about a man who sets out on a three-hour drive across the Arizona desert to meet his fiancee in California but never shows up at his final destination. ...
Diagnosis of a Congenital Disorder
By Patrick R. Field, Paula Cobos, Cheylena Williams
This progressive disclosure case study explores the medically-related issues of a female infant born with the congenital disorder Sirenomelia, more commonly known as "Mermaid Syndrome." The case starts with a high-risk mother participating in prenata...
By Keith K. Schillo
This case explores the question of whether gender identity is determined strictly by genetics (nature) or social variables (nurture). It is based on a true story about a man who was raised as a girl and later rejected the female gender identity...
By Dustin J. Eno, Annie Prud’homme-Genereux
This four-part interrupted case on phage therapy was developed for a freshmen non-majors course in molecular biology. The case begins with a story inspired by real events where Europeans imposed a treatment for cholera on the unwilling population of ...
By Susan Bandoni Muench
In this interrupted case study, students examine the cooperative courtship behavior of long-tailed manakins. Males of the long-tailed form leks, areas in which males display for females in groups. Leks in this species consist of two to 11 males, with...
By Karin Grimnes (rr)
This interrupted case study is a story about Carrie and her infant daughter Hayden who share similar symptoms: weight loss, metabolic abnormalities, and endocrine glands that just won't quit - as well as autoimmune complications. Students will eventu...
By William D. Rogers
This clicker case is based upon the case "Stem Cells: Promises to Keep" written by Lauren E. Yaich and published by the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science. The case is formatted as a PowerPoint presentation (1.5 MB) punctuated by ques...
Mini Cases in Psychoactive Drugs and Their Effects on the Brain
By Darlene A. Mitrano
Designed for an upper-level psychology class titled Brain & Behavior, this series of mini-cases can be used in any undergraduate course that covers the major classes of commonly abused legal and illicit psychoactive drugs from a biological standp...
By Jeffrey A. Steinmetz, Reed M. Perkins
This case study focuses on the growing issue of water use rights in the southeastern United States. Approximately 1.3 million people in North and South Carolina depend on the Catawba-Wateree River for water and electricity. The river is also importan...
By Tamar L. Goulet
This clicker case introduces the human menstrual cycle and its associated misconceptions by following the story of Ann, a newlywed college student. Ann worries that she is pregnant and confides in her friend, Karen, a biology major. By following thei...
Resistance Is Futile, Or is It? The Clicker Version
By Steven L. Telleen
This clicker case is an adaptation of a case by Annie Prud'homme-Généreux that was originally published by the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science titled "Resistance Is Futile ... or Is It? The Immunity System and HIV Infection." It ...
By Deborah Engelen-Eigles
This four-part problem-based learning case examines cultural conflicts between Western medicine and non-Western traditional healing practices. Students consider notions of cultural relativism and ethnocentrism through the lens of social institutions,...
By Eric Ribbens
This case explores two-species interactions, especially mutualism, and presents students with a problem, namely, the inconsistent treatment of the concept of mutualism and symbiosis in many textbooks. It begins with a question that students will prob...
By Jianli Zhou, Peggy Brickman
FOXP2 was first identified as a human language gene when a mutated version of the gene was found to cause speech problems in the KE family in London. In 2009, a research team transferred the cloned FOXP2 gene into mice and demonstrated that the FOXP2...
By Norris Armstrong
This "clicker case" was designed to develop students' ability to read and interpret information stored in DNA. Making use of personal response systems ("clickers") along with a PowerPoint presentation, students follow the story of "Jason," a student ...
By Hannah L. Rusch, Jim A. Perry
This interrupted case engages students in issues contributing to the increase of dengue fever in Jamaica. The overall goal of the case is to make clear the connections between land use management and public health, specifically dengue fever. Students...
By R. Deborah Overath
This interrupted case dramatizes the discovery of a Mendelian trait in humans, namely the variation in the ability to taste the chemical phenylthiocarbamide (PTC). By examining data and questions related to this trait, students will draw connections ...
By Kristy J. Wilson
Sam, a pre-med college student, routinely gets dialysis and develops a urinary tract infection. The infection is from a bacterium that the news media is calling a "superbug" from India. Sam does some internet searches to find out more information abo...
By Joan-Beth Gow, Susan Nava-Whitehead, Kerri W. Augusto
In this interdisciplinary case, students meet Josie, the main character, who suffers from a variety of symptoms. Students must grapple with the conflicting data presented, which ultimately leads them to a diagnosis of either porphyria or schizophreni...
By Nancy A. Rice
This clicker case introduces students to the biochemistry of lipids through the story of Pete, a college student who begins to consider his nutritional fat intake after watching a commercial for the cholesterol-lowering drug Vytorin. In this case, st...
Osmosis is Serious Business! Hebrew Translation
By Troy R. Nash
This directed case study, translated from the original English into Hebrew, involves two “stories,” each concerned with some aspect of osmosis in living cells. Part I is centered around the effects of a hypertonic environment on plant cells, whil...
By Debby Walser-Kuntz
Taylor's doctor notices she has swollen lymph nodes and an elevated white blood cell count on her routine annual exam and asks her to return for a follow-up flow cytometry test to rule out chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). Students follow along as ...
By Ling Chen, Lalitha S. Jayant
It's Mother's Day and Dolly, a high school senior, is making a Mediterranean salad for her mom, who is a college chemistry major and who likes to take every opportunity to teach Dolly what she has learned in school. Today is no exception, as she guid...
By Annie Prud’homme-Genereux
Cancer is usually thought to be a disease that affects individuals. But could cancer evolve to become infectious? This case follows the research on a form of transmissible cancer that is decimating the Tasmanian devil, the world’s largest carnivoro...
By Kristen N. Hausmann, Karen M. Aguirre
This interdisciplinary case study introduces us to the Greens, a family with a recently diagnosed autistic child. Autism is one of several disorders grouped within the acronym ASD, or autism spectrum disorders. Autistic children have problems with co...
Do Corridors Have Value in Conservation?
By Andrea Bixler
This case study discusses conservation corridors as a means to reduce the problems of population size and isolation in a fragmented habitat. In an interrupted format, students learn what a corridor is, consider how nature preserves and corridors func...
By Kathleen G. Brown, Sharon S. Ellerton
This case study is designed to integrate important aspects of the nervous and muscular system portions of an anatomy and physiology course. Students follow the story of “Kathy,” whose symptoms involve both sensory and motor components of the nerv...