Webpage for the full semester course 8.592 in Spring 2003
Welcome to the Homepage for 8.398 in IAP 2002
The course is organized by Prof.
Mehran Kardar
, with lectures by
Professors
Chris Burge
,
Leonid Mirny
,
Alexander Van Oudenaarden
, and
Sebastian Seung
Lectures and Seminars:10:00 to 12:00am
, from January 8 through February 1, in room
1-390
, as listed in the
Course Schedule
.
Credit: This 9 unit courseis is primarily intended for graduate students in the Physics Department, and a background in Statistical Mechanics is assumed.
Catalogue Description: A survey of problems at the interface of statistical physics and modern biology: Bioinformatic methods for extracting information content of DNA; gene finding, sequence comparison, phylogenetic trees. Physical interactions responsible for structure of biopolymers; DNA double helix, secondary structure of RNA, elements of protein folding. Considerations of force, motion, and packaging; protein motors, membranes. Collective behavior of biological elements; cellular networks, neural networks, evolution.
Justification: There has been an explosion of biological data in the past few years, such as the complete genome of many organisms from bacteria to human, the structures of some RNA and numerous proteins, and the expression profiles of thousands of genes by chip technology. Converting this enormous data to useful biological knowledge requires a multitude of computational and statistical tools, as well as novel conceptual perspectives. Progress in this task requires knowledge of a number of issues such as optimization, partitioning, pattern recognition, collective behavior, which are in the domain of statistical physics. Since the central task of statistical physics is to describe how complex behavior emerges from interaction of large numbers of basic elements, its tools and concepts should be valuable in bioinformatics. The aim of this course is to introduce and explore some topics at the interface of physics and biology.