Students in the biomedical science programs in SGS have the opportunity to take computational classes regardless of their specific discipline. This aligns with the goal of the NIH that each graduate program provides training opportunities in addition to their technical courses that equip trainees with quantitative/computational approaches.
DataCarpentry or Software Carpentry Workshops
Every year in early January, we offer a two-day boot camp. Data Carpentry and Software Carpentry workshops are for any researcher who has data they want to analyze, and no prior computational experience is required. This hands-on workshop teaches basic concepts, skills, and tools for working more effectively with data. The focus of this workshop will be working with data and data management & analysis. They typically cover cover metadata organization in spreadsheets, data organization, connecting to and using cloud computing, the command line for sequence quality control, and bioinformatics workflows.
View more information about the DataCapentry Genomics Workshop
Computational Genomics
16:761:505 (Three credits) Fall Semester (Note this class will not be offered in Fall 2022)
The main focus of this course is to learn R programming and apply it to the analysis of genomic datasets. In this course, we will focus on the basics of programming, data wrangling, creating user-defined functions, and exploratory graphical data analysis. The primary data sets considered will contain genome sequences, genome annotations, RNA-seq, and/or other expression data from multiple model organisms.
View the syllabus of the Computational Genomics Course
Bioinformatics
16:765:585 (Three credits) Fall Semester (Note this class will not be offered in Fall 2022)
This course is designed to introduce experimental biologists to bioinformatics concepts, principles, and techniques within the framework of basic shell scripting and web-based databases/tools. Prior to starting class, students are expected to know how to work in a command-line environment and have a basic understanding of programming/scripting. The course includes a brief introduction to working with UNIX/LINUX systems, writing Python scripts, and automating/using existing applications for the analysis of large datasets. All work will be done in a live development environment.
View the syllabus of the BioInformatics Course
Python Methodologies
16:137:552 (3 credits) Fall, Spring, and Summer
This course acts as an introduction to computer programming with the Python programming language. The basics of imperative programming will be covered as well as selected areas of computer science, object-oriented programming, and data structures. Computer programming is about problem-solving so we will begin to think about how to solve problems in discrete steps as computers do. After the beginning of the course, when we have our sea legs, we will begin to introduce ideas from Data Science and use what we have learned about computer programming and problem-solving in this area.
View the Python Methodologies syllabus
Python for Research Bootcamp mini-course
16:695:621 (1 credit) Fall
This course is specifically designed for students who have no programming background, or learned to program but not in Python. This course will teach basic Python programming using the Jupyter notebook platform. Skills learned in this course will include using the Jupyter notebook platform, and use of variables, multiple data types, functions, conditional statements, math and Boolean operations, programming with loops, and input/output. Students will use their own laptops, but no software needs to be installed.