Dr. Annkatrin Rose

Bioinformatics (BIO 5650)

This course is a graduate-level introduction to bioinformatics from the perspective of a molecular biologist wishing to use computational tools for research. I am currently the only one teaching it at ASU and it is offered in Fall semester of uneven years. The course is taught in the computer lab and combines lecture with hands-on exercises.

The objective of this course is to familiarize molecular biology students with the type of biological information and research tools available to them, therefore enabling them to use such resources in their research projects. Students will learn how to mine biological databases for information, retrieve and analyze biological sequence data, and predict sequence features and relationships. Each student is expected to develop and conduct an independent computational project, ideally connected to their graduate research, and write a term paper on their results.

Prerequisites:

This course deals heavily with DNA and protein sequence analysis. It will be helpful to review the principles of the genetic code, levels of protein structure, and molecular evolution prior to this course. This is an application and user-focused course, no knowledge of computer language or programming is required.