Bioinformatics

School

School of Science, Engineering and Technology

School Interim Dean

Thomas "Ted" Macrini, Ph.D.

Department

Biological Sciences

Bioinformatics is an interdisciplinary and growing field in science for solving biological, biomedical and biochemical problems with the help of computer science, mathematics and information technology. Bioinformaticians are in high demand not only in research, but also in academia because few people have the education and skills to fill available positions.

The Bioinformatics program at St. Mary’s University prepares students for graduate school, medical school or entry into the field. Bioinformatics is highly applicable to all branches of life sciences and also to fields like personalized medicine and pharmacogenomics — the study of how genes affect a person’s response to drugs.

The Bachelor of Science in Bioinformatics offers three tracks that students can choose.

  • Bachelor of Science in Bioinformatics with a minor in Biology: 120 credit hours
  • Bachelor of Science in Bioinformatics with a minor in Computer Science: 120 credit hours
  • Bachelor of Science in Bioinformatics with a minor in Applied Mathematics: 120 credit hours

Students will take 23 credit hours of core Bioinformatics classes, which included three credit hours of internship or research and three credit hours of a Bioinformatics Capstone course.

BS Bioinformatics Tracks

Minor in Bioinformatics

All courses serving as prerequisites in the School of Science, Engineering and Technology must be completed with a “C” or better in order to advance to the next sequenced course.

BIO 3310. Intro to Bioinformatics. 3 Semester Hours.

The objective of the course is to teach hands-on techniques that can help with solving biological problems. Students will learn to efficiently use multiple genomics and bioinformatics tools, that are freely available, for the analysis of DNA, RNA, and protein sequences and structure. Students will learn how to access biological data from databases, work in genome browsers, and analyze genomic regions. No programming skills are necessary for this course. This interdisciplinary course is helpful for students in the department of Biology, Computer Science, Mathematics, and Chemistry who aspire to go to either graduate school or medical school, or plan to work in the Bioinformatics industry that has experienced exponential growth within the last decade.

BIO 3314. Internship/Research. 3 Semester Hours.

The objective of this course is to provide an opportunity for students in Bioinformatics major to participate in real-life bioinformatics internship or research. This course will be for seniors and juniors. Emphasis will be placed on commonly used genomics/transcriptomics/proteomics/metabolomics projects and the use of standard operating laboratory/industry procedures. Examples of potential collaborative organizations include medical/health centers, molecular genomics labs/companies, computational biology labs/companies, software development/labs companies and biostatistics labs/companies.

BIO 3410. Biostatistics for Life Science. 4 Semester Hours.

This course will provide the background and application of statistical tools for analyzing different types of data frequently encountered by life scientists. The emphasis will be on the applications of various statistical methodology on biological data, using R programming language. This will include contingency table analysis, linear regression and ANOVA, maximum likelihood method and application of statistical tests like t-test, chi-square test and survival analysis. Prerequisites: BL 1401, BL 1402, OR permission of the instructor.

BIO 4311. Bioinformatics Programming with R. 3 Semester Hours.

The objective of this course is to teach students bioinformatics programming techniques using R. The focus of this course will be on development of programs to perform commonly used bioinformatics techniques like pair-wise and multiple sequence alignments. Students will learn computational gene-finding and comparative genomic techniques. They will also learn to create phylogenetic trees and protein-protein interaction graphs. Students will also learn about Hidden Markov models. Prerequisites: BIO/BL 3310 and BIO/BL 3410.

BIO 4312. Bioinformatics Capstone. 3 Semester Hours.

The objective of this integrative Capstone is to provide students with an opportunity to write a thesis on their research and present it in the form of an oral presentation. This course will promote advanced scientific writing and broad perspectives of issues in current Bioinformatics research. Students will demonstrate their ability to integrate concepts to a practical situation by presenting a thesis on the research they have performed in an industrial or academic setting. The capstone must be taken during the senior year.

BIO 4411. Genes, Genomes, and Genomics. 4 Semester Hours.

This course will provide students with a strong background in the theory and techniques of modern molecular genetics-a field that impacts virtually all areas of biology and medicine. An emphasis will be placed on understanding the evidence for critical concepts, including gene regulation, genetic engineering of organisms (recombinant DNA), genomics, advances in molecular medicine and DNA forensic science ("DNA fingerprinting"). Students will be proficient in technical skills relating to DNA sequencing utilizing computer-aided analysis of sequence data and understanding gene expression. Prerequisites: BL 2330 (Genetic Principles), BL 2332 (Cell Biology), & BL 2233L (Cell & Molecular Methods). (All courses serving as prerequisites in the School of Science, Engineering and Technology must be completed with a “C” or better in order to advance to the next sequenced course.) (Lecture 3 hours; Lab 4 hours). Additional fee associated with this course. See fee schedule for details at https://www.stmarytx.edu/admission/financial-aid/tuition/.