Bio::Blogs #9

 
Bio::Blogs #9 has been posted at Public Rambling. In case you don't know, bio::blogs is a bioinformatics carnival.

Speaking of bioinformatics, it's been on my mind recently since we are just now seeing the results of our first two classes of bioinformatics undergraduates. We talked about the best way of creating an undergraduate program in bioinformatics for over ten years before we finally came up with a collaboration between the Biochemistry Department and Computer Science [Bioinformatics and Computational Biology].

The final decision was to try and educate students to be competent in both computer science and biochemistry. I was not in favor of this approach since the two disciplines are very different—that's one of the things I learned from going to computer science seminars and sitting on their graduate committees since 1992.

I think it's hard enough for students to absorb the culture of one field. To learn how researchers think in two different fields is asking too much. So far, the only students we've attracted are those who were in computer science and want to broaden their horizons by learning about bioinformatics. As I expected, they are struggling with the science courses and it's not because they are stupid. Our biochemistry students, on the other hand, are picking up a fair amount of computer training on their own without getting into information theory, database design, or theories of algorithms.

Does anyone else have experience with undergraduate programs in bioinformatics?