You learn it
by teaching it
BiocBot is a free study tool for UBC courses. It can walk you through the material, or sit on the other side of the table and let you do the explaining while it asks the questions.
Before we get to the rate law, what does PFK-1 do to fructose-6-phosphate?
Most study tools hand you the answer. BiocBot asks you to explain it back. Explaining a topic out loud is how you find out whether you are ready for the exam, and it is the hardest thing to practise on your own.
Being taught, and doing the teaching
In tutor mode BiocBot walks you through the unit. In protégé mode it plays the student and you do the explaining. Teaching a topic back is one of the most reliable ways to find out what you have not learned yet, and you can do it here at two in the morning without booking anyone else's time.
BiocBot walks you through it
Hints before answers, reasoning you can follow line by line, and questions pitched at where you actually are in the unit rather than where the syllabus says you should be.
Before we get to the rate law, what does PFK-1 do to fructose-6-phosphate?
You do the explaining
BiocBot plays the student who hasn't got it yet. It asks the simple questions, pushes back when an answer is vague, and stops exactly where your explanation runs out.
Wait, you said high ATP slows glycolysis. Isn't ATP what the cell wants?
Features
Everything BiocBot says comes out of your own course material. Hover a card to read the detail.
For students
For instructors
Overview
Instructors put their own content in, and students join the classes they are taking. Every BiocBot answer comes from that real course material, so you are not left wondering where it came from the way you are with a general AI tool. Do still check it against your notes.
The instructor loads the content
Slides, notes and readings go in directly. BiocBot draws on those, so its answers stay inside what the course has actually covered.
You join your classes
Pick the courses you are taking and enter the join code your instructor shares with the class.
A module is released
The second your instructor posts the module slides for students to access, you can start practicing and reviewing them.
Work through the unit
Each unit comes with its own set of questions. Answer them with BiocBot tutoring you, or take the other side and explain them yourself.
The toggle sits right in the chat box, next to where you type. Flip it mid-session and BiocBot changes sides with you, so you are never stuck in one mode for a whole study session.
BiocBot was built so that students and instructors can both see how well a particular learning objective or content theme has been understood, rather than guessing at it from a midterm.
The study buddy program
A study buddy pilot at UBC paired around 1,300 students across several classes, so everyone took a turn tutoring and a turn being tutored. Students who took part finished with grade averages 1.5% above those who did not, and in some classes the gap was as wide as 5.5%.
Even so, about half the students in every class never got to join. Their work shifts clashed with the meeting times, or the commute made it impossible, or they had family to look after. BiocBot exists so that studying this way no longer depends on two people being free in the same room at the same time.
Read the study buddy paperJones et al., 2025. "Study buddy learning is associated with academic success in undergraduate science courses." bioRxiv 2025.05.20.655056.
What it looks like
Meet the BiocBot team
Eden Fussner-Dupas
Assistant Professor of Teaching
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Medicine
James Enns
Professor
Psychology, Arts
Warren Williams
Associate Professor
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Medicine
Patrice Belleville
Associate Head / Associate Professor of Teaching
Computer Science, Science
Bowen Hui
Associate Professor of Teaching
Computer Science, Mathematics, Physics & Statistics, Science
Veronica Dudarev
Research Associate
Psychology, Arts
Al Rohet Hossain
Graduate Student
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Achol Jones
Undergraduate Student
Neuroscience
Daniel DeHeer-Amissah
Undergraduate Student
Kinesiology
Gabrielle Reznik
Undergraduate Student
Microbiology & Immunology
The Incubator team
Learning Technology Innovation Centre, UBC.
Rich Tape
LT Incubator Lead
Maziyar Dowlatabadibazaz
Programmer Analyst
Sabrina Yuan
Student Developer
Justin Tang
Student Developer
Jayoung Lee
LTIC HR
Start with this week's unit
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