Be very careful when deciding which laboratory you choose to work with.

Grade: 89. I don't really know how to rate this subject because everyone's experience will be very different depending on what lab/project you choose. Personally, I didn't really enjoy my project, it was not something that interested me that much and obviously that tainted my experience. I liked the group that I was with, everyone was really nice and really supportive, but I did feel like the expectations were a bit too high for what this project is meant to be (which again will not happen to everyone), also my supervisor was not the best at giving progress feedback and my lab head was very rarely around so that's also something you might have to keep in mind. My project did not go as I expected at all and had to change my aims halfway through the semester which left me with a lot of unreliable and half finished results. 10 weeks is not really enough for you to be able to complete a project properly, you will have a lot of loose ends left which is expected so be prepared for that. The presentation was alright, but the report is a beast, albeit very, very rewarding to deliver. Don't be fooled by the 3000 word limit, that's just introduction, results and discussion. All in all it ended up being 6500+ words. The lit review did help though, so make sure you do it even if its not assessed. Not to mention that that it takes twice if not three times the effort of a normal 12.5 point subject. This should def be a 25 point subject imo. I do not recommend doing it on a full load, and especially not with heavy subjects alongside it. I only took 3 and one of them was an easy elective and I still struggled some weeks. Even though my experience was not the best, I still recommend it for people looking to do research honours/masters. It's an easy way to make connections with a lab (2 of my friends are going to stay in the same lab for honours) and it does teach you a lot more about research than a classic prac subject. I don't regret taking it, but I do wish I had taken on a project that suited my interests more, so def be picky with the projects/lab you reach out to. Make sure you are genuinely interested and make sure you discuss the actual project before you say yes cause that's where I went wrong.

The Biomedical research project (BIOM30003) is the best subject I took in my Undergraduate science degree. It gives you an excellent first look into research and although it is the most demanding subject I took. I found a great aspect was once you got comfortable with what you were doing, you got to have a large say in when you did your work. You need to take the initiative and approach researchers about running a project with them, however I found most people I contacted were more than willing to talk about the possibility of a project. A big part for my project being enjoyable was and also how fantastic my supervisors and other researchers in the lab were, along with the project itself being very interesting. Anyone interested in going on to do research I recommend you try this as a first taste. Also so you have an idea on what it entailed, the subject involved a 3000 word written report, an oral presentation and a mark from your supervisors for how engage you were.