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Bioinformatics and Computational Biology

About BICB
Background
BICB was established in 2007 as a result of legislative funding and support driven by the recommendations of the Governor of Minnesota's appointed Rochester Higher Education Development Committee (RHEDC).  The committee recommended the collaborative development of an institution that focuses on health science, bioscience, engineering, and technology. This institution is the University of Minnesota Rochester.

Vision
The vision of the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (BICB) program to establish world-class academic and research programs at the University of Minnesota Rochester by leveraging the University of Minnesota’s academic and research capabilities in partnership with Mayo Clinic, Hormel Institute, IBM, National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP), the Brain Sciences Center and other industry leaders. The goal is to advance informatics and computation that provide applications to economic activities via innovation, translational research, and clinical experiences to support a strong life science industry in Minnesota.

Mission
The mission of the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (BICB) graduate program is to provide interdisciplinary education in the area of biomedical informatics and computational biology at the interface of quantitative sciences, medicine, and biology. The graduate program trains graduate students in the development and applications of computational methods and to work in interdisciplinary teams of life scientists and computational scientists. The program offers industrial and clinical internships and training in business leadership, technology management, and ethics to prepare students for the workplace. Faculty provide education through formal coursework, research seminars, and one-on-one advising. In addition, the program provides a mentoring program for students and junior faculty that will serve as a model for interdisciplinary graduate education.

Current News

  • Sep 2, 2021: Congratulations from the BICB program to Prof. Walter Low. He was selected by the American Society of Neural Therapy and Repair (ASNTR) as the recipient of the 2021 Bernard Sanberg Memorial Award, the highest award given for research on restoring neurological function.

  • Aug 26, 2021:The Annual BICB orientations was held virtually via Zoom and in-person to welcome our new graduate students and faculty from 4-5:30pm.

  • Aug 19, 2021: The 8th Annual BICB Industry symposium was held virtually on August 19, 2021 with external keynote speakers from IBM, Boeringher Ingelheim and Octant. More information of the symposium can be found here.

    Orientations will be held virtually via Zoom to welcome our new graduate students and faculty from 3-5pm. All members and affiliates of the BICB program are welcome. Click here or follow the information below to join remotely.

  • May 5, 2021: Congratulations to Mattea Allert (Adviser: Ran Blekhman. She is one of the recipients of the 2021 President's Student Leadership and Service Award.

  • April 19, 2021 - Congratulations to Henry Ward (Adviser: Chad Myers) and Stephen Heinsch (Adviser: Michael Smanski). Both have been awarded the Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship for the 2021-22 academic year by the graduate school.

  • Apr 6, 2021:  Congratulations to Bhupinder Juneja (Adviser: Kingshuk Sinha) as a member of the student team that won the U of M Interdisciplinary Health Data Competition on Health Disparities & Community Impact of COVID-19.

  • Jan 14, 2021 - The 13th Annual BICB Research Symposium was held virtually. The theme for this year's symposium was "Data Analytics in Genomics and Imaging."

  • Jan 8, 2021 - Congratulations from the BICB program to Prof. Wei Pan. He has been elected to the Academy for Excellence in Health Research. He is the second BICB faculty elected to the academy since it was first established in 2003.

  • Dec 29, 2020 - Congratulations to BICB MD/PhD student Kevin Lin (Advisers: Chad Myers, Anja Bielinsky), who has been awarded an NCI/NIH F30 Fellows

  • Dec 10, 2020 - Congratulations to Megin Nguyen (Adviser: Yuk Sham). She has been awarded the 2021 UMII - MnDRIVE Graduate Assistantship.

  • September 1, 2020 - Annual BICB orientations will be held virtually via Zoom to welcome our new graduate students and faculty from 3-5pm. All members and affiliates of the BICB program are welcome. Click here or follow the information below to join remotely.

  • Aug 15, 2020 - Congratulations to Alisa Nelson (Adviser: Peter Crawford). She has been awarded the Interdisciplinary Doctoral Fellowship for the 2020-21 academic year by the graduate school.

  • July 22, 2020 - The 7th Annual BICB Industry Symposium will be held virtually on Aug 20,2020. The theme is "Combating the COVID-19 Pandemic". Registration is now open. 

  • April 28, 2020 - Congratulations to Serina Robinson (Adviser: Larry Wackett). She is the co-recipient of the 2019 PNAS Cozzareli Prize in biomedical science. As a Fullbright scholar, Serina spent a year with Dr. Mette Svenning in Norway studying methane consuming bacteria and their contribution to global warming.

  • April 20, 2020 - Congratulations to Tatiana Lenskaia (Adviser: Dan Boley). She has been awarded the Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship for the 2020-21 academic year by the graduate school.

  • April 8, 2020 - Congratulations to Breanna Shi, our incoming doctoral student this Fall. She has been awarded the Diversity of Views and Experience (DOVE) Fellowship for the 2020-2021 academic year by the graduate school. She will be advised by Dr. Noelle Noyes.

 

Seminar and Events

BICB Colloquium
Thurs 5pm, Zoom Webcast ( Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Colloquium)
https://umn-private.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUqc-ivpzgtGNGO6zXkGvWnAz-nR7ZKWK-O

9/16 Sian Durward-Akhurst,  Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences
9/30 Hongbo Pang, Department of Pharmaceutics
10/14 Xiao Dong, Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development
10/28 Eric Batchelor, Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology 
11/11 Julia Liu, Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology 
12/9 Damien Fair, Department of Pediatrics 

    BICB ADMISSION
    Degree Programs
    People & Committees
    Student Handbook
    BICB Contacts
    BICB Events

    News Archive

    • March 6 - Congratulations to our Michelle Cox (Adviser: Saad Kendarian). She was the recipient of the Best Abstract Award for outstanding basic/translational science research at the recently held Transplantation & Cellular Therapy Meeting in Orlando.

    • March 11 - Congratulations to our second year BICB graduate student, Alisa Nelson (Adviser: Peter Crawford, MD, PhD). She has been awarded the Interdisciplinary Doctoral Fellowship for the 2020-21 academic year by the graduate school

    • January 14, 2020 - 12th Annual BICB Research Symposium was held at the University of Minnesota Rochester campus. 

    • October 25, 2019 - BICB open house was held at the Cancer & Cardiovascular Research Building (CCRB)
       
    • August 16, 2019 - The 6th Annual BICB Industry Symposium was held at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities.
       
    • August 27, 2019 - Mayo News Network has highlighted a new study, authored by our BICB PhD student Zachi Attia. The study, "Age and Sex Estimation Using Artificial Intelligence From Standard 12-Lead ECGs" was published in the scientific journal Circulation: Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology.
       
    • August 27 and August 28, 2018 - Annual BICB orientations were held in both the Twin Cities and Rochester campuses this week to welcome our new graduate students and faculty. 
       
    • April 27 - Congratulation to Sambhawa Priya (Adviser: Ran Blekman). She has been awarded the Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship for the 2019-20 academic year by the graduate school.
       
    • April 5 - We are now on Linkedin. Come join us in promoting and tacking the bioinformatics and computational biology challenges in Minnesota!
       
    • April 1, 2019 - New BICB initiative to provide research training to underrepresented undergraduate or post-bac students who are interested in pursuing advanced degree(s) in the BICB program. Awardees will be selected based on personal statement, diversity statement, and academic record. The deadline for application is April 12, 2019. For more information, click here. To apply click here.

    • February 11, 2019 - BICB PhD student, Nishitha Paidimukkala (Adviser: Rebecca Morris), was the highlight on a recent SciTechsperience article entitled "The Joy of Data: An Internship with StemoniX". It is  a reflection on her industrial internship experience with a small startup company specializes in stem cell solution for drug development and discovery.

    • February 9 - Congratulation to Christopher Dean (Adviser: Noelle Noyes). He has been selected for the highly competitive IBM summer internship program. He will be working with some of IBM's newest bioinformatics databases and pipelines at the IBM's Almaden Research Laboratory in San Jose, California, this summer.

    • February 1- Congratulation to Tatiana Lenskaia (Adviser: Daniel Boley). She has been awarded the Interdisciplinary Doctoral Fellowship for the 2019-20 academic year by the graduate school.

    • January 22, 2019 - BICB PhD student, Richard Abdill, and faculty, Ran Blekman, were highlighted in recent Nature News entitled "What bioRxiv’s first 30,000 preprints reveal about biologists".

    • January 15, 2019 - The 11th Annual BICB Research Symposium was held at the University of Minnesota Rochester

    • January 7, 2019 - Mayo News Network has highlighted a new study, authored by our BICB PhD student Zachi Attia. The study, "Screening for cardiac contractile dysfunction using an artificial intelligence–enabled electrocardiogram" was published in the scientific journal Nature Medicine.

    • November 1, 2018 - The University of Minnesota Research News highlighted a new study, authored by our BICB PhD student Pajau Vangay and BICB faculty Dan Knights. The study, "US Immigration Westernizes the Human Gut Microbiome" was recently published in the scientific journal Cell.

    • August 28 and August 29, 2018- Annual BICB orientations were held in both the Twin Cities and Rochester campuses this week to welcome our new graduate students and faculty.

    • August 23, 2018 - Congratulations to BICB doctoral student, Erik Gaasedelen, for been selected as one of the top 25 candidates in the Lyft and Udacity Partner for Self-Driving Hiring Challenge.

    • August 17, 2018 - BICB Rochester students visit the Twin Cities Campus for the 5th Annual BICB Industry Symposium.

    • August 6, 2018 - BICB PhD student, Michelle Cox, and faculty, Krishna Kalari, were highlighted in the recently held Computational Genomics Course at Mayo Clinic.

    • September 30, 2016 - Two BICB PhD students, Gabriel Al-Ghalith and Pajau Vangay, received MnDRIVE UMII Graduate Fellowships.

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