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Instructor: Etsuko Moriyama (School of Biological Sciences, 403 Manter Hall, emoriyama2@unl.edu) Date/Time: Tue/Thu 11:00 am - 12:15 pm Office hours: Tue/Thu after the class until 1:00 pm, or by appointment Classroom: 203 Manter Hall Course catalog and registration information: Class # 3703/3704 Prerequisites: BIOS201 or parallel; CHEM251 or CHEM261; or permission. Basic statistics recommended. Course Web: http://bioinfolab.unl.edu/emlab/Courses/BIOS877/current/index.html Suggested textbook: Marketa Zvelebil & Jeremy Baum. 2007. Understanding Bioinformatics. Garland Science, New York, NY. [not required; Kindle version is also available for rent or purchase] Course description:This introductory bioinformatics course covers major topics in bioinformatics including pairwise alignment, multiple alignment, similarity search, protein domain search, distance estimation, phylogenetic reconstruction, gene prediction, protein classification, and protein structural analysis. Fundamental concepts of molecular evolution and their relevance to bioinformatics studies will be emphasized. Students will learn:
At the end of the semester, students will be able to choose appropriate bioinformcs methods for the given data, use these methods to analyze the data, interprete the obtained results, and extract biological significance from them. Furthermore, students will be able to self-learn and use new bioinformatics methods when they encounter in the future. Course preparation:Students are expected to understand the basic molecular biology/genetics. This course does not include any review session for molecular biology and genetics. A check list is available for basic molecular biology/genetics keywords. You are expected to be familiar with at least these keywords. Chapters 1 and 2 of the optional textbook (listed above) have nice description of molecular biology basics. Online materials for self-study are available in Molecular Biology/Genetics/Genomics Tutorials under the Links page (see the Menu at the top). Programming ability is not required nor expected. Students are required to use computers with internet connections for their homework assignments. Contact the instructor if computer support is necessary. This course does not include a computer lab component. Students will use various bioinformatics tools for their homework assignments by themselves. If you are an undergraduate student and interested in more hands-on experience with some bioinformatics and genomics software, you may want to check BIOS337 Basic Applications of Bioinformatics (offered in the fall). For more adavansed topics including next-generation data analysis, check BIOS426/826 Computational Systems Biology (online course usually offered in the fall). A list of other courses covering more specific bioinformatics topics (including those offered by other departments) is found in Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, and Related Courses at UNL (also listed at the bottom of the Links page). Course requirements and grading:There is no in-class exams. Instead, multiple homework assignments will be given throughout the semester, approximately one assignment/week. They will include:
— Complying the Fifteenth Week Policy — The final assignment will be due at the end of the 15th week. This final assignment will cover the contents from the entire semester, and will be longer than the regular assignments. Course Web and CANVAS pages:The course website is used to post the information related to this course. It will be updated frequently. Assignments, grading policy, references, and more information are available through CANVAS course page. It will be also used to distribute messages. Check both sites regularly. IMPORTANT!! Check your email address on your CANVAS account. If it is not correct, you may miss important messages. University-wide course policies:The university-wide course policies and information for the services/resources available for all students are found in the Course Policies website. |