Departments
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Week of 2 October 1998 |
Vol. II, No. 8 |
Feature
Article
$2.5 million NSF grant to integrate biology with information sciences
by Brian Fitzgerald
Citing the need for a more interdisciplinary approach in the engineering programs of American universities, the National Science Foundation (NSF) recently awarded $2.5 million over the next five years to Boston University's bioinformatics program.
Bioinformatics is an emerging field that combines biology and information sciences. Headquartered in the departments of biomedical engineering, biology, and chemistry, bioinformatics has led to advances not only in basic biology, but also in medicine, agriculture, energy, and the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, according to Charles DeLisi, dean of ENG and leader of the program.
"The emergence of biotechnology and the explosion of activity in genetic engineering, including the mapping and sequencing of complete genomes, is generating vast amounts of biological information that holds the key to understanding many of the basic processes of life and development," says DeLisi. "We need individuals trained both in biological sciences and in computational sciences in order to organize, synthesize, understand, and apply this information."
In 1986, when DeLisi directed the U.S. Department of Energy's health and environmental research programs, he organized one of the first large conferences proposing the Human Genome Project. As a result of the project, which began the following year, the partial or complete sequences for approximately 46,000 genes are now available in public databases, with as much as twice that number in private databases. Charles Cantor, another pioneer in the Human Genome Project, directs BU's Center for Advanced Biotechnology. The Center, which also relies on informatics in its research, focuses on the development of such new biological materials as modified segments of DNA that are potentially suitable as new gene-specific drugs. Noting that DNA databases are now the major driving force in drug discovery, Cantor said in last year's University Lecture that "more drugs, more effective drugs, and cheaper drugs should become broadly available."
The grant is part of a $40.5 million NSF initiative to develop programs that will better prepare students for the wide variety of emerging careers in the rapidly evolving fields of science and engineering. Of 623 applicants, 17 colleges and universities were chosen to take part in the NSF's Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) program. BU and Harvard University are the only New England institutions involved.
The bioinformatics program at BU integrates courses and research in biology with computer modeling and information sciences. It will primarily draw on faculty from three departments, biomedical engineering, chemistry, and biology, and three interdepartmental centers -- the Center for BioDynamics, the Center for Computational Science, and the Biomolecular Engineering Research Center. In addition, the program draws on the University's own resources in massively parallel supercomputing as well as computing resources available to it as a partner in the National Computational Science Alliance.
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BU's bioinformatics program
was initiated by College of Engineering Dean
Charles DeLisi, and operates under the direction of
Charles Cantor (left), who is also the director of
BU's Center for Advanced Biotechnology, and Temple
Smith, professor of biomedical engineering and
pharmacology. Photo by
Fred Sway
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Anticipating the changing demographics of the workforce, ENG has built in a strong recruitment element with outreach to women and minority students. In addition, some of the curriculum development workshops in bioinformatics for college teachers and distance learning programs in bioinformatics will be delivered to undergraduates at minority colleges.
Indeed, President Clinton recently directed his National Science and Technology Council to come up with suggestions by the end of the year on how to achieve greater diversity in scientific and technical jobs. IGERT is also responding to recommendations from the National Academy of Science's Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy (COSEPUP), whose 1995 report, "Reshaping the Graduate Education of Scientists and Engineers," advised repairing the "misalignment" between how graduate students are trained and what employers seek. COSEPUP identified communication and teamwork skills, multidisciplinary and applied research experience, and adaptability as essential.
The NSF grant comes just as the University is implementing its strategy to build on its strengths in the biological and biochemical sciences. The department of biology, for example, has added five new faculty members this year and plans to add ten additional faculty over the next five years, expanding its capabilities in the interdisciplinary areas of molecular ecology and evolution, the molecular biology of cell regulation, and neurobiology. At the same time, the chemistry department has been expanding its existing strengths in biochemistry, including DNA footprinting, sequence analysis, molecular mechanisms, and protein folding. (See related story in News and Features.)
"A new pedagogical approach is needed to meet the needs of tomorrow's Ph.D.s," says Joseph Bordogna, NSF acting deputy director. "As well as being astute in a discipline, they must also be prepared to address intellectual issues that transcend disciplinary boundaries, since much new knowledge is increasingly created at the interfaces of traditional disciplines. The IGERT investment is an attempt to develop educational models toward this end with a direct focus on the integration of education and research."