Computational Biology & Bioinformatics

Several faculty members have been working at IOE in the fields of computational biology, bioinformatics, and mathematical modelling, covering such subjects as population genetics, molecular evolution, genome organization and evolution, proteome evolution, genomic mapping, phylogenetic analysis and comparative genomics. Study questions for computational research include phylogenetic inference (e.g. bacterial evolution and lateral gene transfer), genomic mapping of traits of interest in plants and animals (e.g. desirable traits of wheat, pheromones of ants, recombination regulating factors in various organisms), or inferring selection pressures on genomes and investigating the genomic basis of adaptations (e.g. adaptations to different latitudes in the circadian clock, adaptations in social organization of ants, and artificial selection of domesticated traits). Institute members teach computational analysis of molecular evolution (as part of the Bioinformatics program), organize workshops and conferences (e.g. IBS2016), and support bioinformatic research (e.g. computational infrastructures such as the Hive cluster).