BCB410
BCB410H1F - 2017
Contents
Objectives and Participants
The "Applied Bioinformatics" course is offered as a part of the BCB Program curriculum to ensure that our students know enough about application issues in the field to be able to put their knowledge into practice in a research lab setting. This is to support the Specialist Program goal: to prepare students for graduate studies in the discipline.
As a required course in the BCB curriculum, BCB410 assumes the prerequisites and goals of fourth-year students in the BCB Specialist Program. Other students may be permitted to enrol on a case by case basis, but they may need to catch up on prerequisites in computer science or life-science courses that BCB students have taken at this point. Generally speaking, this is an advanced course that presupposes familiarity with programming principles, algorithm analysis, and methods of modern systems biology, as well as introductory knowledge of linear algebra, graph theory, information theory, statistics, as well as molecular–, structural– and cellular biology. The varying topics will be discussed at a highly technical level that is likely only useful for students who plan to integrate much of this material into their actual practice.
Knowledge Network
This year's course will focus on "Data Science" in bioinformatics.
- <command>-Click to open the Knowledge Network in a new tab, scale for detail.
- Hover over a learning unit to see its keywords.
- Click on a learning unit to open the associated page.
- The nodes of the learning unit network are colour-coded:
- Live units are green
- Units under development are light green. These are still in progress.
- Stubs (placeholders) are pale. These still need basic contents.
- Milestone units are blue. These collect a number of prerequisites to simplify the network.
- Integrator units are red. These embody the main goals of the course.
- Units that will be developed by students for this course are yellow.
- Units that require revision are pale orange.
- Units that have a black border have deliverables that are designed to be submitted for credit (not relevant for this course).
- Arrows point from a prerequisite unit to a unit that requires it.
For reference, and for links to other information sources, consider the Knowledge Network for the BCH441 - Bioinformatics course.
Organization
Details for the 2017 course will be discussed in our first class session, Wednesday, September 13, at 10:00 in Bahen BA025.
It is imperative that you attend the first class session in person. Do not enrol in this course if you can't attend the first class session.
Dates and Location
Classes meet Wednesdays between 10:00 and 12:00 in BA025 (Bahen Centre) throughout the Fall Term. Classes start at 10 minutes past the hour.
Coordinator
Office hours
(Virtual) face to face meetings are by appointment, if required. However, we will be able to resolve almost all issues by e-mail. You will find that discussions by e-mail are both more efficient and effective than meetings. Moreover e-mail discussions leave you with a document trail of what was discussed, can contain links to information sources, and we can share points of general interest more easily with the class.
Contact
Contact within the class is easiest via the Google Group that you will subscribe to at the beginning of class.
Phases
We will work in four phases:
- You will design a learning unit and draft its contents;
- The class will work through the unit;
- We will go through "Code reviews" of the material;
- You will respond to the review and improve the material.
Marking
| Activity | Weight | |
| Initial design of your unit | 20 marks | |
| Participation in Review panels | 4 x 10 marks | |
| Final version of unit | 20 marks | |
| Journals | 15 marks | |
| Insights! | 5 marks | |
| Total | 100 marks | |
What makes an excellent grade? See here.
Notes
