Open Education: Virtual Labs

A "getting started" guide overviewing open, editable, and lower-cost textbooks and open teaching & learning resources for faculty, students, and librarians.

Teaching remotely (Arts and Sciences)

Read about the OpenSTEM Labs approach from the Open University
The core values of the OpenSTEM Labs are:
- Inclusivity: accessible at any time from any place by anyone.
- Pedagogy: interactive and collaborative investigations enable individual and group working for student-led or tutor-led active learning.
- Veracity: users work with real data, derived from real equipment.
- Authenticity: the labs feature bespoke teaching tools, industrial grade equipment and research grade instruments, each in their home environment.
VCUArts Z.O.M.B.I.E. Survival Guide Google Doc
Teaching art remotely. from Virginia Commonwealth University.
Teaching Theatre Online: A Shift in Pedagogy Amidst Coronavirus Outbreak
A 40+ page of resources and pedagogical approaches from Dr. Daphnie Sicre for teaching theatre online.

Lists of Virtual Labs, Studios, Sims, Interactive resources for teaching STEM topics

Virtual Lab and Science Resource Directory (BCcampus)
Courtesy of BCCampus. Blog post on how this list was developed: https://bccampus.ca/2020/06/18/spoiled-for-choice-virtual-labs-for-science-education SEE ALSO: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Mv0EyCw2QeFIpW5P5qNR5EWdcM4pPpLPRnBDHMfaxgQ/edit#
200+ Online Resources for Science Laboratories
Crowd sourced list from various sources. Includes .edu .org, and commercial sources.
Labs Designed for Students without Access to Special Equipment
Courtesy of Open Oregon Educational Resources
Moving Science Labs Online
Courtesy of California Community Colleges
Remote Lab Activities and Experiences
from Dartmouth
Labs and Simulations (from Colorado College of Mines)
CalState University / UCal Virtual Labs
Dissemination of IT for the Promotion of Materials Science (DoITPoMS)
Materials Science resources
- A library of approximately 74 Teaching and Learning Packages covering a range of topics in Materials Science
- A library of 5 Lecture Demonstration
-Packages demonstrating simple principles of Materials Science
-A library of almost 900 micrographs
-A library of over 150 short videos
-A small library of standalone simulations

Finding Pre-Lab Videos

Journal of Visualized Experiments (2016-2018) [open access]
Journal of Visualized Experiments (2018- )
Library subscription. Not open access.
JoVE is a platform for online journals that provide peer-reviewed videos and articles on scientific experiments. The library currently subscribes to the behavior, biology, bioengineering, chemistry, immunology and infection, medicine, and neuroscience sections.
JOVA Science Education
Library subscription. Not open access.
JoVE Science Education provides streaming videos on science fundamentals in biology, psychology, chemistry, environmental sciences, and clinical skills.
Springer Nature Experiments
Library subscription. Not open access.
Springer Nature Experiments is a set of peer-reviewed, reproducible procedures or protocols for scientific experiments in the life sciences with step-by-step instructions in HTML and PDF and some streaming videos. 1980s-present.
SAGE Research Methods Video
Library subscription. Not open access.
This resource provides streaming video tutorials, interviews, case studies, and mini-documentaries covering the entire research process.
Locating lab experiment videos on YouTube
Use the "filters" to identify videos with Creative Commons licenses, sort by duration, date uploaded, etc.
Lab Safety videos
from NC Community Colleges BioNetwork

eBooks available from the University Libraries

Creating Web-Based Laboratories by C. C. Ko; Ben M. Chen; Jianping Chen
ISBN: 9781852338374

Publication Date: 2004-12-03

Covers the transmission of real-time video and audio for internet experimentation. Provides detailed descriptions of how the various hardware and software systems can be seamlessly integrated for a complete internet remote experimentation system. Contains examples of real working experiments that are currently running.
Advances on Remote Laboratories and e-Learning Experiences; by Advances on Remote Laboratories and e-Learning Experiences;
ISBN: 9788498306620

Publication Date: 2007
Cyber-Physical Laboratories in Engineering and Science Education by Auer, M., Azad, A.K.M., Edwards, A., De Jong, T. (Eds.)
ISBN: 9783319769356

Publication Date: 2018
Remote Instrumentation and Virtual Laboratories by Franco Davoli (Editor); Norbert Meyer (Editor); Roberto Pugliese (Editor); Sandro Zappatore (Editor)
ISBN: 9781441955951

Publication Date: 2010-03-19
Web-Based Control and Robotics Education by Spyros G. Tzafestas (Editor)
ISBN: 9789048125043

Publication Date: 2009-08-27

Virtual Microscopes & slide collections

Virtual Microscope for Earth Sciences
Free but requires login.
Examine 3D specimens and microscope images of rocks, meteorites & moon rocks. [See also https://www.virtualmicroscope.org ]
Virtual petrographic microscope
Free but requires login.
Body tissues under microscope (SDK100)
Free but login is required.
Adipose tissue: virtual microscope
Free but login is required.
This slide collection includes one set of slides with brown and white adipose tissue from normal or cold-adapted rats. It illustrates the development of brown (thermogenic) adipose tissue in cold-adapted animals.
Basalt lava flow and volcanic tuff virtual microscope
Free but login required.
Virtual Urchin
Gametes of sea urchins

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Gametes of sea urchins yield exceptional experiences in the classroom; teachers and students alike are riveted by being able to observe fertilization, cell division and embryonic development. The gametes are easy to use, the developmental stages are readily seen with the microscope and the rapidity of fertilization and early cell divisions allows the student to ask questions and obtain answers within the bounds of a normal classroom schedule. The goal of this project is to make these remarkable embryos readily accessible through development of inquiry based lessons, available on a freely-accessible, open access website. Students can then move beyond the early embryo, and explore how scientists study sea urchins to understand larval development and metamorphosis, community ecology, pollution in the marine environment and biological evolution.
Microscope basics
NC Community College BioNetwork's Virtual Microscope
Histology (with link to Histology Lite Mobile App)
From University of Michigan. [Note: uses AdobeFlash for which support will be discontinued as of December 2020.]
Virtual Microscope from UIUC
Currently providing 90 samples totaling over 62 gigapixels of image data. The Virtual Microscope, which is available for free download supports functionality from electron, light, and scanning probe microscopes, datasets for these instruments, training materials to learn more about microscopy, and other related tools. The project is open source and the code is available on Sourceforge.

Finding Remote Laboratories

IRIS
Virtual and Remote Laboratory (VR-Lab) in the Department of Engineering at Texas Southern University (TSU)
Virtual Lab: http://vr-lab.engineeringtech.tsu.edu/index.php/Virtual_Lab Remote Lab contact: https://coset.tsu.edu/vrlab
Fourier spectrums (OpenEngineering Laboratory)
Free, but requires a log in.
Robotic radio telescope over the web (ARROW)
Free but requires log in.
Fine Beam Tube
Free, but requires login.
Pendulum
Free but requires login.
Virtual Ocean Dives
Free but requires login.

Electronic Lab Notebooks

JupyterLab
Project Jupyter exists to develop open-source software, open-standards, and services for interactive computing across dozens of programming languages. JupyterLab is a web-based interactive development environment for Jupyter notebooks, code, and data. JupyterLab is flexible: configure and arrange the user interface to support a wide range of workflows in data science, scientific computing, and machine learning.

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JupyterLab is extensible and modular: write plugins that add new components and integrate with existing ones. Try it here: https://jupyter.org/try
eLabFTW
A free and open source electronic lab notebook; secure, modern and compliant system to track your experiments efficiently but also manage your lab with a powerful and flexible database.

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If you do experimental research, then eLabFTW is for you. Whatever your field is. It is also well suited for universities, tinkerers or biotech companies. eLabFTW is powered by PHP/MySQL in Docker containers. It should be installed on a server. One install can be for a team, or the whole institution. You can also install it on your computer just for yourself.
ELN Features Matrix
List of 30+ electronic lab notebook systems. Matrix provided by Harvard Medical School.
Web-based, Free and Open-Source, and Proprietary ELN software
16 various electronic lab notebook systems.