Computational Biology Program

The Computational Biology program is jointly offered by the Faculty of Science and School of Computing beginning from July AY2004/05.

This is a multi-disciplinary program involving participation from ten Departments spanning across three Faculties/Schools. They include the Departments of Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Physics, Computational Science, Mathematics, and Statistics and Applied Probability from the Faculty of Science, the Department of Computer Science from the School of Computing and the Departments of Biochemistry, Microbiology and Pharmacology from the Faculty of Medicine.

Details
The field of Computational Biology is a well-recognized and fast emerging discipline in scientific research, with the potential of producing breakthroughs likely to impact the whole spectrum of the life sciences.

Its distinguishing feature is the explosive growth of data generated by the post-genomic era and proteomics research, requiring novel and state-of-the-art computational approaches and instrumentations for their most effective analysis.

The main objective of this program is to provide a multidisciplinary education that would produce graduates who would be equally at ease with algorithm design, mathematical and statistical analysis as they would be with biochemistry, biology/genetics, and wet-lab know-how.

This discipline has today a well-connected peer community, with a host of well-established conferences and publication venues. Research has also been concomitant with the emergence of a vigorous professional market, spearheaded by pharmaceutical and biomedical industries.

Prospects
Graduates from the program will be more equipped for a career in the fast-paced pharmaceutical, biomedical or biotechnology industries. This will also help meet the demand of the local market for talents with such skill sets.

Moreover, the breadth of instruction will pave the way for good students to pursue graduate studies in the M.Sc. Program in Bioinformatics, which is currently under consideration by the university.

Applications download form
Duly completed application form (with supporting documents) must be submitted to S16 General Office, School of Computing by the closing date: 29 December 2004 5.00 pm for new students admitted in Semester 2, AY 2004-5.