College of Letters and Science
172 Boyer Hall
Box 951570
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1570
Bioinformatics
310-825-0068
Program e-mail
Bioinformatics is defined broadly as the study of the inherent structure of biological information. It is the marriage of biology and the information sciences. Examples of current bioinformatics research include the analysis of gene and protein sequences to reveal protein evolution and alternative splicing, the development of computational approaches to study and predict protein structure to further understanding of function, the analysis of mass spectrometry data to understand the connection between phosphorylation and cancer, the development of computational methods to utilize expression data to reverse engineer gene networks in order to more completely model cellular biology, and the study of population genetics and its connection to human disease.
Graduates in bioinformatics can expect to engage in any combination of research, teaching, clinical service, and consultation. Within universities and research centers there is a growing need for bioinformatics researchers who can analyze new sources of high-throughput experimental data in biology, medicine, and bioengineering. Biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies also seek bioinformatics graduates for applied research on disease—and drug discovery. Medical centers are also increasingly hiring bioinformatics graduates as genomics data become important in medical research and clinical applications.
