Enhancing student engagement with introductory microbiology and immunology topics using a novel board game.

ABSTRACT: In introductory microbiology courses for non-biology majors, it can be difficult to ensure that students gain a functional understanding of the interplay between the host immune system and an invading infectious agent. Immune Battle is a board game that allows students to explore pathogen evolution and the immune system's response to incursions in a captivating way, leveraging battleship and worker placement styles of gameplay. Students play in teams as either a pathogenic microbe attempting to reproduce and transmit itself to new hosts or as the immune system trying to defend the host from infection. Immune Battle seeks to mimic real-world interactions between immune cells and microbes using board game mechanics. For example, students will quickly find that adaptive immune system actions

SUBMITTER: Rivard RS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11636227 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature