Scientific content
The Frontiers in Life Sciences Bachelor program is not just another biology program; it offers interdisciplinary training to students who are curious about the sciences in general. Although living systems are at the core of what is studied during the FdV Bachelor, the training it provides is well balanced among biology, physics, chemistry, mathematics, and computer science.
Organization of the six semesters
A two-week immersion session at the beginning of the first semester enables students to familiarize themselves with the FdV Bachelor program and to meet and become acquainted with the teaching staff and the other students. Optional courses are limited during the first year so that all FdV students may attain a common level of basic knowledge.
Optional courses and training are offered during the second year, and the role of student projects is more important. As in the first year, courses remain organized around certain themes encountered in the coursework of various disciplines.
In addition, the final two semesters of the FdV Bachelor program do not include any discipline-specific obligatory courses. Semester five will be carried out in a French or international partner establishment, and semester six will be spent doing an engineering or research internship. However, those two final semesters will include week-long introduction and summary sessions, during which students will meet, first to prepare their internships, then to present their internship experiences to their peers and to the teaching staff.
A detailed list of the courses offered during all six semesters appears below:
Semester 1: Life, matter, and movement: observation and description
Semester 2: Stability and change
Semester 3: Living and bio-inspired systems
Semester 4: Interactions and communication
Semester 5: Acquisition of deeper knowledge (in a partner establishment)
Semester 6: Practical application of acquired knowledge (internship preparation, fulfillment, and review)
SEMESTER 1: Life, matter, and movement: observe and describe
UE 0: Science, knowledge, and methods (introductory weeks)
UE 1: Mathematics: Approaches and measurement with mathematics
UE 2: Physics: What is movement? What is energy?
UE 3: Chemistry: What is matter? What is energy?
UE 4: Biology: Unity and diversity of living systems
UE 5: Computer science: Discovering informatics tools
UE 6: Project: Scientific methodologies
UE 7: Professionalization: (course and mini-internship)
SEMESTER 2: Stability and change
UE 8: Mathematics: Describing and understanding structures
UE 9: Physics: Equilibrium and transport phenomena
UE 10: Chemistry: How do molecules transform themselves?
UE 11: Biology: The dynamics of living systems
UE 12: Computer science: Elementary programming
UE 13: Project: Laboratory life
UE 14: Interdisciplinary seminar (full week)
UE 15: Project: Students' individual choices
SEMESTER 3: Living and bio-inspired systems
UE 16: Systems Biology and bioengineering
UE 17: Physics: Circuits and biomimetics
UE 18: Chemistry: Macromolecular and surpramolecular structures
UE 19: Engineering: Signal treatment and analysis
UE 20: Computer science: Algorithmics and applications
UE 21: Mathematics: Mathematics for research
UE 22: Project: Didactics
UE 23 / 24: Ramifications and enrichment
Students select two courses from among the following options:
- Introduction to economics
- Student commitment unit
- Chemistry-biology unit taken from the Paris Descartes University pharmaceutical curriculum
- Specialized unit from the Paris Descartes University Biomedical Sciences bachelor curriculum
- Biochemistry 3: enzymology and metabolism
- Physics 3: Imagery and probing of living systems - waves
- Genetics 1
- Immunology
- Biochemistry 5: Molecular biology and systems biology
- Physics 5: Imagery and probing of living systems - from the molecule to the organ
- Crystallography - stereochemistry - spectroscopy
- Another science unit from outside the FdV Bachelor curriculum (FdV teaching staff approval required)
SEMESTER 4: Interactions and communication
UE 25: Biology: Flux and interaction networks
UE 26: Physics - Biology: Waves and complexity
UE 27: Chemistry - Biology: Chemical signals: from electrons to molecules
UE 28: Mathematics - Biology: Mathematics for biology
UE 29: Computer science: Applications and perspectives
UE 30: Group project (15 ECTS)
SEMESTER 5: Acquisition of deeper knowledge
The fifth semester is accomplished in an outside institution. Students first consult the FdV teaching staff in order to verify the coherence of the courses they choose in the partner establishment. It could be a matter of developing their knowledge in one of the disciplines studied during the first two years of the FdV Bachelor program, or, on the contrary, it could be to pursue an interdisciplinary direction, notably in the case of students who are oriented toward engineering schools. Although the ECTS grades are delivered by the host establishment, validation of the fifth semester requires participation in a concluding summary week similar to the one at the end of the fourth semester, in which all students deliver presentations that cover a scientific theme studied during the semester.
SEMESTER 6: Practical application of acquired knowledge
UE 31: Internship preparation
Students will receive project management training prior to starting their internships. Methods of communication in professional settings, data security, and industrial property will also be covered.
UE 32: Internship: According to their individual projects and goals, students are guided by the teaching staff in choosing an internship theme and a host establishment (public or private laboratory, industry, small- to-medium-sized enterprise, in France or abroad.) In particular, for students who intend to end their university studies upon obtaining the FdV Bachelor and to create an enterprise, the internship schedule is reduced and accompaniment is proposed for putting their projects into practice.
Consult / download the detailed UE program
Direct link to the PDF document