[BioEdu] Forward of moderated message

[Sami Khuri]

--Hello,
	I would just like to add that I agree 100% with
everything that Dave Messina (whom I do not know) wrote.
And as he mentions at the end of his msg, there are many
other good universities including the Univ of California
system (Berkeley, Santa Cruz...) Goerge Mason, etc..
Actually, if you go to
http://wiki.bioinformatics.org/Bioinformatics_FAQ
and move to item 6:
6 Education: Where can I study Bioinformatics...
you will find programs all over the world.
	All the best with your studies.
--Sami Khuri, Professor
Department of Computer Science
San Jose State University
One Washington Square
San Jose, CA 95192-0249
USA
Tel:   (408) 924-5081
Fax:   (408) 924-5062
eMail: khuri at cs.sjsu.edu
URL:   http://www.cs.sjsu.edu/faculty/khuri


On Thu, 12 Jul 2007, David Messina wrote:

> Hi M,
>
>
> > I'm not sure how one chooses a grad school, I have been told that I
> > should decide on what aspect of bioinformatics I would like to
> > research and find a school with someone who specializes in that,
> > although I honestly don't know enough about an bioinformaticians or
> > the schools at the moment.
>
> I would argue that the area of biology you might be interested in
> (e.g. infectious diseases, cancer, evolution, neurology) is not a
> particularly important criterion for choosing a bioinformatics
> program. Since you are unfamiliar with bioinformatics, it's more
> important that you learn about all of the different types of work
> that comprise bioinformatics, ranging from sequence analysis to
> comparative genomics to protein structure prediction. I would bet
> that any program will teach these topics. Once you join a program,
> you will meet many researchers working on a broad range of topics,
> and so probably you will have more than enough to choose from.
>
> I do think it's extremely valuable, though, to learn as much biology
> as you can, particularly since you are stronger on the computer
> science side of things. One of the challenges of being a
> bioinformaticist is working at the interface of these two fields. Not
> only will you need to be competent in both areas, but you will need
> to be able to talk to -- and often translate between -- colleagues
> who are on either side of the divide.
>
>
> > The undergraduate program I was part of also did not have all of
> > the classes which are pre-reqs in some of the programs I have
> > looked at.  For instance my program did not involve Organic
> > Chemistry and at least one of the programs requires two semester of
> > it as a pre-req. I am not sure how this situation is dealt with.
>
> I would recommend you contact the bioinformatics programs you are
> interested in, explain your situation, and see what the procedure is.
> By the way, getting to know the people at the different schools, both
> by phone and email, is a good way for you to get a better feel for
> the program and for them to get to know you.
>
>
> > The three schools I have looked at currently are Johns Hopkins,
> > Stanford, and University Of Wisconsin.
>
> There's also Northeastern University, University of Illinois at
> Chicago, Marquette University, North Carolina State University,
> Eastern Michigan, University of Pittsburgh, and Virginia Commonwealth
> University, and those are from just the first page of Google hits for
> "bioinformatics masters".
>
> Good luck!
>
> Dave
>
> --
> Dave Messina
> Genome Sequencing Center
> Washington University
> St. Louis, MO
>
>