6.891 Computational Evolutionary Biology
  The Course
  Lecture
  Labs
  Assignments
  Tools

Staff
Prof. Robert C. Berwick
berwick@csail.mit.edu
32-D728, x3-8918
Office hours: W 4:30-5:30

Course Support
Fifa Monserrate
fifa@mit.edu
32-D733, x3-2184

Course Time & Place
Lectures: M, W 3-4:30 PM
Room: 32-144,  map
Laboratories: tba
Room: 32-044

Level & Prerequisites
Undergraduate/Graduate or permission of instructor

Course Description

Evolution from a computational, modeling, and engineering perspective. Why has it been easier to develop a vaccine to eliminate polio than to control influenza or AIDS? Has there been natural selection for a ‘language gene’? Why are there no animals with wheels? When does ‘maximizing fitness’ lead to evolutionary extinction?  How are sex and parasites related? Why don’t snakes eat grass? Why don’t we have eyes in the back of our heads?  How does modern genomics illustrate and challenge the field? Extensive hands-on laboratory exercises in model-building and analyzing evolutionary data.

General Policies on Required Work, Grading, and Collaboration
Prerequisites,Textbooks, and readings

Class days in blue, laboratory due dates/class days including final project in red, holidays in green, reg add/drop dates in orange.

September 2004
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October 2004
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November 2004
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December 2004
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Week
Monday
Wednesday
Reading
Laboratory
1
Rice, chapter 1
2
Forces of evolution II:
optimization
Rice, chapters 1 & 2
Forces of evolution
3

Forces of evolution III: mutation, migration. Laboratory 1 out

Forces of evolution IV: genetic drift
Rice, chapter 3
4
Evolution at the moelcular level, I
Evolution at the molecular level, II
Rice, chapters 3&4; Hall, appendix 1
5
Evolution at the molecular level, III
Laboratory 2 out
The algebra of evolution: Price's theorem I
Rice, chapter 6
Evolutionary genomics
6
Holiday

The algebra of evolution: Price's theorem II
7
Detecting selection
Detecting selection: a case study

8
Codon volatility

Coalescent theory and phylogenetics
Hall, chapters 1 & 2
Evolutionary phylogenetics
9
Evolutionary phylogenetics

Evolutionary phylogenetics
Hall, chapters 2 & 3
10
Quantitative genetics I
Quantitative genetics II; host-parasite interactions
Rice, chapter 7
Evolution of disease
11
Host-parasite interactions & disease models
Evolutionary stable strategies
Rice, chapter 9
12
Developmental evolution
Quantitative genetics II
13
Final project
presentations
Final project
presentations
14
Final project
presentations
Finale:
the future of evolution
Final projects due

 

 
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