511809 - SURFING THE MOLECULAR BASIS OF DISEASE WITH BIOCOMPUTING

The Biocomputing Laboratory is an activity in which students are exposed to hands-on Computer Lab sessions covering topics related to in silico biomedical matters such as: phylogenetic trees, amino acid sequence analysis, protein structure analysis and prediction, rational protein modification and design, protein-protein interaction and drug-protein interaction. Biocomputing sessions are conducted in a mixed mode: lecturer instruction (how to perform operations); students hands-on; knowledge dissemination by the lecturer (handling and interpretation of data, problem understanding and solving and interactive Q & A sessions); performance of remote (web-based databases and software servers) and local (downloaded and installed free computer programs) tasks. Students will acquire essential skills through hands-on laboratory, instrumental for the development of the basic knowledge necessary to interrogate in silico systems (including artificial intelligence agents). The module is divided into six sessions of which the first five take the students progressively deeper into protein design with examples from Faculty research and pathology-related matters. The last session consists in the presentation of essays by the students divided into groups. In the presentations students will have to tackle a biocomputing aspect of their choice yet related to a specific pathology and demonstrate that they familiarized with the bioinformatic tools experienced during the Biocomputing Laboratory module.