In this three-component project, students (i) use a transposon to generate mutants that they screen for auxotrophs and characterize through biochemical complementation, (ii) use rare cutting restriction enzymes and pulsed-field gel electrophoresis to physically map the transposon insertions, and (iii) recover the transposon insertions for restriction mapping and subsequent sequencing in order to generate a genetic and physical map of a bacterial chromosome. The focus is on student involvement in original research.