How do you give students a chance to have some hands-on lab experience during a pandemic? That was the question that motivated the team from the introductory biology series courses to figure out a way.

With the need for mass COVID-19 testing on campus, UC Davis offers a course in which students can work at the testing kiosks and learn more about the various aspects of the virus.

The two-credit course, titled “Mass Testing for COVID-19,” or EVE 198, is managed by David Coil and led by Professor Jonathan Eisen in the evolution and ecology department in the College of Biological Sciences.

This October marks the 10th anniversary of the Allen Distinguished Investigator program, which was launched in 2010 by Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen to back creative, early-stage research projects in biology and medical research that would not otherwise be supported by traditional research funding programs.