MSc Clinical Immunology / Course details

The Research Skills Masterclass (Clinical Immunology) unit aims to provide students with the theoretical understanding and practical skills relating to clinical laboratory-based immunological techniques. Students will receive both theoretical and practical instructions relating to key immunological wet-laboratory procedures to enable them to understand the use of these methodologies in a clinical context, analyse the data, interpret the results and assess the reliability of the findings.

The research skills masterclasses will take the form of two laboratory and one computational practical session, allowing students to gain hands-on experience of well-documented techniques used in the Clinical Immunology field such as protein analysis, flow cytometry and the analysis of genetic variants.

Good laboratory practice for working safely and recording experimental procedures and outcomes in a standard laboratory notebook will be covered. Students will develop and be assessed on their reporting and analytical skills, including the interpretation of results in a clinical context.

Through studying and applying the taught content in this Unit, students will be able to:

1. Understand the technical principles and quality assurance of the assays used to assess the components of an immune response.
2. Acquire technical competence in a range of biomedical and computational techniques used in the context of clinical immunology.
3. Analyse and interpret data from methodologies using the clinical context.
4. Develop a critical understanding of the limitations of particular techniques and their
   applications.
5. Display best practice for recording experimental procedures and outcomes in a standard laboratory notebook.
6. Develop awareness of good laboratory practice in laboratory health and safety and
   understanding how to keep themselves and those around them safe within a laboratory environment.

• Short answer questions based on laboratory practical results (15%)
• Written assignment- patient case report (60%)
• Online multiple choice questions test (25%)

Marks and feedback will be provided online in accordance with the University of Manchester's Policy on Feedback to Undergraduate and Postgraduate Taught Students.