| As the twentieth
century drew to a close, the branches of science undergoing
the most rapid change were biology (where new molecular insights
were revolutionizing our understanding of living systems)
and computer science (in which technological and conceptual
breakthroughs were creating an unprecedented increase in
our ability to gather, store, and analyze data). A natural
outcome of this situation was the formation of a new field,
bioinformatics, in which computers are applied to the challenges
of deepening our understanding of life science.
UMBC has
an established and growing interest in bioinformatics. Within
the department of Biological Sciences, four faculty members
have research groups dedicated to bioinformatics, and numerous
other faculty use a significant computing component within
their research (from phylogenetic reconstruction to sequence
alignment and structural investigations). More important,
UMBC is deeply committed to a future of interdepartmental
and interdisciplinary research that is crucial to this emerging
frontier of research. As such we have active and growing
bioinformatics connections to the departments of Mathematics
and Statistics, Chemistry and Biochemistry, Computer Science,
and the School of Engineering.
Omland, Kevin
Computational challenges related to hybridization, lineage sorting & phylogenetic trees of recently diverged species. We have an NSF grant to compare methods of "species tree inference". Kann, Maricel
Computational approaches for the detection of protein domains and protein interactions, and bioinformatics methodologies to understand the molecular basis of diseases. Bustos, Mauricio
We conduct research on the development of hierarchies within multi-agent system communities, and stochastic modeling of network phenomena Erill, Ivan
Application of soft-computing paradigms to open questions in genomics, focusing primarily on regulation. Research into DNA-binding site identification. |
