This course will be a hands-on introduction to essential bioinformatics skills. The goal is to build a foundation of computational skills that enable analysis of large biological data. We will learn command line Unix/Linux, shell scripting, and installation/testing/usage of popular public bioinformatics packages. We will spend significant time learning Perl and/or Python and Matlab. The course will rely heavily on problem based learning and in class discussion. Assignments will involve analyses that use primary literature data, particularly next gen sequencing data. 50% of the final grade is based on a research project conceived and carried out independently. No prior programming experience is necessary. Three term hours.
