Academics

The purpose of this interdisciplinary concentration is to prepare Computer Science students to enter science-intensive fields of bioinformatics, computational biology, computational chemistry and molecular modeling including genomics and proteomics. With the advent of the Human Genome Project, an explosion of genomics information has occurred, and databases such as GenBank and EMBL have grown at a rate that now requires storage, organizing and indexing of the information. Questions of gene expression have led to computational biology, the process of analyzing genomic sequences and to the field of proteomics, the understanding of protein structure and function. The information obtained by computational biology and computational chemistry is used in the design of new drugs to treat a variety of diseases. Major drug and biotechnology companies are seeking people trained in bioinformatics.

In addition to the requirements for the Major in Computer Science:

BI 141               Introduction to Cellular and Molecular Biology

BT 378              Bioinformatics

CH 120             General Chemistry I*

CH 121             General Chemistry II*

CS 400             Database Design**

MA 201             Calculus II***

MA 303             Mathematical Modeling

One course from:

BI 203               Genetics

BI 204               Microbiology

BI 306               Developmental Biology

BI 353               Tree of Life: Evolutionary Systematics

BI 371               Molecular Biology

BI 375               Virology

BI/CH 410         Biochemistry

BT 376              Biotechnology

+requires additional prerequisite courses beyond those required for the major and concentration.

*count as the two Lab Science courses required in the CS major Ancillary requirements.

**counts as one of the four CS major Elective requirements.

***counts as the additional level 200+ Mathematics course required in the CS major Ancillary requirements.