BIOSCI107: nail every assessment, not just read the notes
Your complete guide to University of Auckland's biology for biomedical science: cellular processes course. See where the marks are, work real practice questions, and study with an AI tutor that knows BIOSCI107.
Sia generates BIOSCI107 practice questions, walks through introduction to the cell and cell communication step by step, and quizzes you on the material the heaviest assessments weight most heavily.
Worked example
A neuron at rest has a membrane potential of about -70 mV. A stimulus opens voltage-gated sodium channels and the membrane depolarises to +30 mV. Which statement best explains the repolarisation that follows?
Separate the two phases. Depolarisation to +30 mV is caused by sodium entry through voltage-gated sodium channels. Repolarisation is a different event with a different set of channels.
At the same time, voltage-gated potassium channels open. They are slower to respond than the sodium channels, which is why their opening coincides with the peak rather than the start.
Potassium now leaves the cell down its electrochemical gradient, removing positive charge from the inside and driving the potential back toward and briefly past the resting value. The sodium-potassium pump restores the concentration gradients over time but is far too slow to cause repolarisation itself.
The trap: Attributing repolarisation to the sodium-potassium pump, which is option B. The pump maintains the concentration gradients that make the action potential possible, but it moves ions far too slowly to account for a millisecond-scale voltage change. The other frequent error, option D, is assuming sodium flows back out through the sodium channels; it does not, because those channels inactivate and because the electrochemical gradient still favours sodium entry. classic slip!
One exam decides 40% of your grade. Controlled assessment: AI tools prohibited. This whole page is built around that.
Overview
What BIOSCI107 is, and where it sits
BIOSCI 107 is one of the four core Stage 1 courses used for selection into the University of Auckland's clinical programmes, which is the first thing worth knowing about it. It is taken by students heading toward Biomedical Science and Health Sciences degrees, and performance in it carries weight well beyond the fifteen points on your transcript.
The content moves from structure to mechanism. You begin with how human cells and tissues are organised, then work through cell structure and function, energy harvesting, cell communication, the path from gene to protein, cell division and cancer. From there the course moves into transport across membranes, blood and immunity, and finally the excitable tissues, neurons and muscle, where the material becomes properly mechanistic.
Assessment splits 80% theory and 20% practical. The critical structural fact is that the mid-semester test and the final exam cover different content: the test examines the first three topics and the final examines the last four. Neither is cumulative, which changes how you should revise. Alongside these sit the laboratory programme and a set of online feedback quizzes that are the easiest marks in the course.
Always treat your own course outline and the exam timetable as authoritative.
Difficulty & time commitment
Is BIOSCI107 hard, and how much time does it take?
BIOSCI107 is manageable if you keep a weekly rhythm and treat the back half as the main event. The pattern is consistent: it starts gently and steepens, and the heaviest assessment is the part that separates grades.
The difficulty curve and the assessment weighting point the same way: the back half is harder and worth more. Front-loading effort there is the highest-return decision in the course.
Is this course for you
Who tends to do well, and who tends to struggle
You will likely do well if
- You revise the test material and the exam material as two separate bodies of content, because that is exactly how they are assessed.
- You learn mechanisms as causal chains rather than as lists. Explaining why potassium efflux repolarises a membrane is worth more than naming the phases.
- You do the online feedback quizzes every week. Ten free marks accumulate quietly and cost nothing but attention.
- You use the per-lecture learning objectives as your revision checklist, since they map directly onto what the test and exam can ask.
You may struggle if
- You assume the final exam is cumulative and spend the exam period re-revising Lectures 1 to 14, which are not on it.
- You memorise terminology without the underlying mechanism, which collapses as soon as a question asks you to explain or predict rather than name.
- You treat the laboratories as attendance. They are a fifth of the grade and four of them are controlled assessments.
- You let 33 lectures accumulate unreviewed. The volume is the real difficulty in this course and it is only manageable incrementally.
- Build one mechanism diagram per major process: membrane transport, signal transduction, gene to protein, the action potential and excitation-contraction coupling. Draw them from memory until they are fluent.
- For immunity, keep innate and adaptive strictly separate and be able to state which cells, which molecules and which timescale belong to each.
- Work the clinical illustrations properly. Cystic fibrosis and secretory diarrhoea are taught as applications of epithelial chloride transport, and applied questions are where distinction marks sit.
- Use the practice tests and exams from earlier years alongside the 2026 study questions to check whether you can explain, not just recognise.
Syllabus
The 12 topics, topic by topic
The exam-weight marker on each topic shows where the marks concentrate. The amber topics carry the highest exam weight.
T1 · Cells and tissues: organisation and epithelia
Tortora and Derrickson, Asia-Pacific 4th edLevels of organisation in the human body, and the structure and function of epithelial tissue.
T2 · Connective, muscle and nerve tissue
Tortora and DerricksonThe remaining primary tissue types, their components and where each is found.
T3 · Introduction to the cell and harvesting energy
Tortora and Derrickson; Campbell Biology 12th edOrganelles and their roles, and cellular respiration and ATP production.
T4 · Cell communication and signalling
Tortora and DerricksonReceptors, second messengers and signal transduction pathways.
T5 · From gene to protein
Tortora and DerricksonTranscription, translation and the regulation of gene expression.
T6 · Cell division, DNA mutations and cancer
Tortora and DerricksonThe cell cycle, mitosis and meiosis, mutation types, and how loss of cell-cycle control produces cancer.
T7 · Transport across cell membranes
Tortora and DerricksonDiffusion, osmosis, facilitated transport, active transport and the electrochemical gradient.
T8 · Epithelial transport and clinical applications
Tortora and DerricksonChloride secretion and transcellular traffic, illustrated by cystic fibrosis and secretory diarrhoea.
T9 · Blood composition and innate immunity
Tortora and DerricksonBlood components and their functions, infection, and the innate immune response.
T10 · Adaptive immunity, antibodies and hypersensitivity
Tortora and DerricksonAntibody structure and gene rearrangement, cellular immunity and histocompatibility, allergy and the hygiene hypothesis.
T11 · Excitable tissue: neurons
Tortora and DerricksonResting membrane potential, action potential generation, and conduction along an axon.
T12 · Excitable tissue: muscle
Tortora and DerricksonExcitation-contraction coupling, the sliding filament mechanism, and muscle tissue types.
How it's assessed
Assessment structure
| Component | Weight | Format & timing |
|---|---|---|
| Final exam | 40% | In-person, on paper, invigilated. Covers Lectures 15 to 33, that is the last four topics. University of Auckland Semester 1 examination period. Controlled assessment: AI tools prohibited. |
| Mid-semester test | 30% | In-person evening test, 90 minutes. Covers Lectures 1 to 14, that is the first three topics. Mid-semester, evening sitting. Controlled assessment: AI tools prohibited. |
| Practical: laboratories and pre-labs | 20% | Laboratory programme with pre-lab preparation. Laboratories 2, 3, 5 and 6 are controlled assessments where AI tools are prohibited. Across the semester. Practical component. |
| Online feedback quizzes | 10% | Twelve topic activities, of which the best ten count at 1% each. Across the semester. Uncontrolled assessment. Two lowest scores dropped. |
- An overall pass is required. No separate hurdle or plussage rule appears in the course materials.
- The critical feature is that the test and the exam are not cumulative and do not overlap. The mid-semester test covers Lectures 1 to 14 and the final exam covers Lectures 15 to 33. This means the second half of the course, including immunity, neurons and muscle, is entirely examined in the final.
This is a coursework course. Coursework carries 60% of the grade and the final exam is the single heaviest piece at 40%, so steady work across the semester decides your result more than any one sitting. Controlled assessment: AI tools prohibited.
Final exam timing: During the University of Auckland Semester 1 examination period. Confirm the exact date and venue on your exam timetable.
How to actually pass it
A weekly rhythm, two checklists, and the traps to avoid
The course rewards consistency over cramming, and practice over re-reading. Here is the loop that works, then what to have nailed before each exam.
The weekly loop
Before the mid-semester checklist
- Know the four primary tissue types, their components and locations.
- Explain cellular respiration and ATP production, and the main organelles involved.
- Trace signal transduction from receptor binding through second messengers to cellular response.
- Explain transcription and translation, the cell cycle, and how mutation and loss of cell-cycle control lead to cancer.
Before the final heaviest topics
- Distinguish the mechanisms of membrane transport and apply them to epithelial chloride secretion and its clinical illustrations.
- Separate innate from adaptive immunity, and explain antibody structure, gene rearrangement, histocompatibility and hypersensitivity.
- Explain the action potential phase by phase, naming which channels are open, closed or inactivated at each point.
- Explain excitation-contraction coupling and the sliding filament mechanism in muscle.
The mistakes that cost marks
Revising for a cumulative final. The final covers Lectures 15 to 33 only. Time spent re-revising the first three topics during the exam period is time taken from the material actually being examined.
Blaming the sodium-potassium pump for repolarisation. The pump maintains the gradients but is far too slow to change membrane voltage on a millisecond scale. Repolarisation is sodium channel inactivation plus potassium efflux.
Confusing channel closure with inactivation. Voltage-gated sodium channels inactivate through a separate gate rather than simply closing, which is what produces the refractory period. The distinction is examinable.
Skipping the feedback quizzes. Ten percent of the grade is available for low-stakes weekly work with two free drops. Losing it makes every exam mark more expensive.
Teaching team
Who teaches BIOSCI107
The bios below are factual. We do not rate lecturers; any star ratings are submitted by students who have taken BIOSCI107.
Anthony Phillips
Directs BIOSCI 107 and lectures on connective tissue and on muscle and nerve tissue in the School of Biological Sciences.
Suzanne Reid
Coordinates BIOSCI 107 and handles general course queries in the School of Biological Sciences.
Monica Kam
Coordinates the BIOSCI 107 laboratory programme and handles lab-specific queries.
John Fraser
Lectures the introduction and the immunology block in BIOSCI 107.
Ben Krinkel
Lectures within the BIOSCI 107 programme.
Teaching team as listed in public course information. AskSia does not rate lecturers; star ratings are submitted by students who have taken BIOSCI107.
Formula & concept sheet
The vocabulary and formulas you must own
- Resting membrane potential
- The voltage across a cell membrane at rest, about -70 mV in a neuron, maintained by potassium leak channels and the sodium-potassium pump.
- Electrochemical gradient
- The combined driving force on an ion from its concentration difference and the membrane voltage, which together determine the direction of passive movement.
- Channel inactivation
- A distinct closed state of a voltage-gated channel produced by a separate inactivation gate, which blocks conduction independently of membrane voltage and creates the refractory period.
- Active transport
- Movement of a solute against its electrochemical gradient using metabolic energy, either directly from ATP or indirectly from another ion's gradient.
- Facilitated diffusion
- Passive movement of a solute down its gradient through a membrane protein, requiring no energy but saturable because the carriers are finite.
- Second messenger
- An intracellular signalling molecule generated in response to receptor activation, which amplifies and distributes the signal within the cell.
- Transcription
- Synthesis of a messenger RNA copy of a gene's coding sequence within the nucleus.
- Translation
- Assembly of a polypeptide at the ribosome according to the codon sequence of the messenger RNA.
- Mitosis
- Nuclear division producing two genetically identical daughter nuclei, the basis of growth and tissue repair.
- Innate immunity
- The rapid, non-specific first line of immune defence, which does not improve on repeat exposure to the same pathogen.
- Adaptive immunity
- The slower, antigen-specific immune response that generates immunological memory and responds faster on re-exposure.
- Excitation-contraction coupling
- The sequence linking an action potential at the muscle membrane to calcium release and cross-bridge cycling in the myofibril.
Common acronyms: ADP · ATP · DNA · ECC · MHC · mRNA · RER · RNA · SER · tRNA.
Set texts
The prescribed reading
The syllabus references map straight onto these.
Principles of Anatomy and Physiology, Asia-Pacific 4th edition
Tortora, Derrickson and colleagues.
Campbell Biology, 12th edition
Urry, Cain, Wasserman, Minorsky and Reece.
BIOSCI 107 Laboratory Guide 2026
University of Auckland School of Biological Sciences.
Where it fits
Prerequisites, related courses & why it matters
No prerequisites or restrictions. BIOSCI 107 is one of four core Stage 1 courses used in selection for the University of Auckland clinical programmes, and is taken in the first year of Biomedical Science and Health Sciences pathways.
Your BIOSCI107 study toolkit
Study the course with Sia, not just read about it
Each tool already knows BIOSCI107: your syllabus, your texts, and where the marks are. Grouped by how you study, from first contact to exam week.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Is BIOSCI 107 hard?
It rates moderate, at the same level as our frozen moderate anchor. The concepts are approachable and there is almost no mathematics, but the volume is substantial at 33 lectures of dense content, and 70% of the grade is decided in two invigilated sittings.
Does the final exam cover the whole course?
No, and this is the most important structural fact about the course. The mid-semester test covers Lectures 1 to 14 and the final exam covers Lectures 15 to 33. They do not overlap. That means the immunity, neuron and muscle material is examined only in the final, and the early cell biology is examined only in the test.
How much does the practical component count?
Twenty percent, made up of laboratories and pre-lab preparation. Laboratories 2, 3, 5 and 6 are run as controlled assessments where AI tools are prohibited. The remaining 10% of coursework comes from online feedback quizzes.
What are the online feedback quizzes worth doing?
Yes, they are the cheapest marks in the course. There are twelve topic activities and the best ten count at 1% each, so two can be dropped without penalty. Students who skip them are throwing away up to ten marks that require no exam-room performance.
Do I need to buy the textbook?
It is recommended rather than compulsory. The course points to Tortora and Derrickson, Principles of Anatomy and Physiology, Asia-Pacific 4th edition, and notes that older editions are fine. Lecture pages give per-lecture learning objectives with Tortora chapter references. Campbell Biology 12th edition is a secondary reference. There is also a BIOSCI 107 Laboratory Guide, available from the bookstore or as a free Canvas download.
Why does this course matter for clinical programme selection?
It is one of four core Stage 1 courses that feed into selection for the University of Auckland's clinical programmes. That makes the grade consequential beyond the credit value, and it is why the course attracts a competitive cohort.
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