BMI Bioinformatics Training Grants

描述（由申请人提供）：我们现在已经进入了基因组时代，这是科学探索的分水岭，其典型特征是大量新的生物数据和将这些数据转化为信息和知识的新技术和方法的快速发展。为了有效地利用由此产生的新机会，至关重要的是，我们要培养懂生物学和计算机的下一代科学家。加州大学旧金山分校生物信息学和计算生物学研究生课程的使命是培养具有定量背景的学生，他们的兴趣显然是在生物学和计算的界面上进行顶级研究。我们的培训计划侧重于应用计算方法来解决生物学中的基础科学问题，特别强调将计算观点整合到生物学研究实践中。在这方面，该项目取得的显著成功之一是与加州大学旧金山分校杰出的生物学家骨干的互动和合作水平显著提高，其中一些人现在是培训教员的成员。该培训项目是加州大学旧金山分校定量生物学综合项目（iPQB）的创始成员之一，该项目提供了一种平衡竞争需求的机制，提供生物信息学和计算生物学的广度培训，并提供足够深度的生物学培训，以便学生能够承担最具挑战性的生物学问题。为了实现这一目标，iPQB项目提供了严格的核心课程，将基础计算、物理和数学原理与生物组织原理相结合。从分子到复杂系统，论文项目的例子包括蛋白质结构和功能的分子水平分析，计算药物设计，以及真核生物信号系统的数学建模。该计划的创新特点还强调以团队为导向的方法来解决问题和科学传播的培训。作为一所完全致力于健康科学的大学，加州大学旧金山分校提供的广泛的研究机会在某种程度上都与公共卫生问题有关。我们的生物信息学和计算生物学专业的学生在许多层面上都对这项研究做出了贡献，无论是通过为旨在了解人类对药物治疗反应差异的药物基因组学研究提供计算视角，还是通过分析全基因组表达模式来确定疟疾等疾病的新药物靶点

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): We are now well in to the Genome Era, a watershed for scientific inquiry typified by an enormous volume of new biological data and rapid development of new techniques and approaches to turn this data into information and knowledge. To harness the resulting emerging opportunities effectively, it is critical that we prepare the next generation of scientists to understand both biology and computing. The mission of the Graduate Program in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology at UCSF is to train students from quantitative backgrounds whose interests are clearly aimed at performing top-level research at the interface of biology and computation. Our training plan is focused on the application of computational approaches to address fundamental scientific problems in biology, with a special emphasis on integration of a computational viewpoint into the practice of biological research. Toward this end, one of the signal successes of the Program has been a notable increase in the level of interaction and collaboration with the exceptional cadre of biologists at UCSF, several of whom are now members of the training faculty. The Training Program is a founding member of a new umbrella program at UCSF, the Integrative Program in Quantitative Biology (iPQB), which provides a mechanism for balancing competing needs to provide both breadth of training in bioinformatics and computational biology with sufficient depth of training in biology so that students can take on the most challenging of biological problems. To achieve this goal, the iPQB Program provides a rigorous core curriculum combining training in fundamental computational, physical and mathematical principles with those of biological organization. Ranging from molecules to complex systems, examples of thesis projects include molecular level analysis of protein structure and function, computational drug design, and mathematical modeling of signaling systems in eukaryotic organisms. Innovative features of the Program also stress team-oriented approaches to solving problems and training in scientific communication. As a university devoted entirely to the health sciences, the broad range of research opportunities offered at UCSF all in some fashion relate to issues in public health. Our students in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology contribute to this research at many levels, whether by providing a computational perspective to pharmacogenomics studies aimed at understanding differences in human response to drug therapy or by analyzing whole genome expression patterns to identify new drug targets for diseases such as malaria