Bioinformatics
The Bioinformatics Program is offered jointly by the College of Engineering and the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Through coursework, collaborative training projects, and dissertation research, students will learn to apply analytic and computational methods and information technologies to current problems in cell and molecular biology.
The program offers both MS and PhD degrees. Its curriculum is designed to provide interdisciplinary training that combines advanced computational methods with the latest techniques in molecular biology. Accepted students will attend a pre-entrance training program in order to establish a common core of knowledge with emphasis on the integration of the biological and mathematical disciplines. The graduate curriculum entails individual courses that integrate mathematical modelling, wet labs, and information sciences; industrial rotations, internships, and grand rounds. Research areas are numerous and include biological information management, gene mining, drug design and targeting, protein and nucleic acid structure, and cellular regulatory networks. Because we are educating future leaders, the program will also include training designed to sensitize students to the social impact of technology, including ethical and legal implications of emerging technologies.
Students in the program have access to state-of-the-art computational facilities, including SGI/CRAY Origin 2000 with 192 processors, SGI POWER CHALLENGE Array with 38 processors, and 2 ImmersaDesks. The experimental facilities include pulse-field apparati, high-speed sequencers, a MALDI mass spectrometer, and various NMR spectrometers.
Admission
Prospective students should have a strong undergraduate background in the hard sciences, engineering, or the biological sciences. Applicants are required to submit scores from the General Graduate Record Examination (use code 3087). Subject Graduate Record Examinations scores are also accepted; normally, the subject test should be taken in Biology, Chemistry, or Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Applicants whose native language is not English are also required to submit results of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). Applicants must submit the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences application. Applications may be obtained from, and all materials sent to: Boston University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, 705 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA 02215, USA. Applications are also available online at the Bioinformatics Graduate Program website at www.bu.edu/bioinformatics. The application deadline for fall admission is December 1. For spring admission, the deadline is October 1.
Curriculum and Requirements
The Bioinformatics Program offers the PhD (post-bachelor’s and post-master’s) and MS degrees. Visit the programs section of this bulletin for more information.
