bioinformatics | An Introductory Undergraduate course in Bioinformatics
Contact Info:
Rob Harbert,
rharbert [at] stonehill [dot] edu
Stonehill College
Course Description
This course introduces common concepts and tools in the field of Bioinformatics with a focus on developing a basic skill set for working with large biological data sets. The digital age has resulted in a period of rapid growth of data, and in biology this is revolutionizing how we look at the world. Understanding how the field uses computational tools to manage and study these massive datasets is a crucial skill set for the modern Biology student. This course will cover the major sources of data in biology and an overview of the myriad of computational tools available
Objectives:
After having completed Introduction to Bioinformatics you will be able to:
Discuss Biology as a subdiscipline in “Data Science”
Understand the major sources of ‘big-data’ in Biology and the scale and nature of the data being produced.
Perform fundamental operations (data input/output, statistics, data visualization).
Use common bioinformatics tools using the Unix command line, R, and Python.
Run bioinformatics programs from the Unix command line to perform analysis of DNA sequence data.
Understand the importance of reproducibility and open access for data and computer code in bioinformatics.