In recent years, biology is stepping into the big data era. New technologies produce unprecedented amount of information: sequenced genomes, gene expression data, proteomics etc. Effective use of these data richness is a major challenge in current biology. Computational biology cope with this challenge by the collaborative work of biologists, computer scientists, engineers and mathematicians. Together, computational biologists aim to create better and more comprehensive models of biological systems. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev meets the computational biology challenge in three fronts: first and foremost, the university offers three educational tracks to train the new generation of computational biologists, fluent in both biology and computation; second, a growing number of scientific groups focus on computational biology in their research; and finally, the Bioinformatics Core Facility makes bioinformatics accessible for experimental groups from Health and Life Science.

Educational tracks

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev offers three BSC programs that combine Life Science and Computer Science. The bioinformatics track (Computer Science), and the biophysics/bioinformatics track (Chemistry) are more focused on the Computer Science aspects, whereas the computational biology track (Life Sciences) emphasizes biology. For more details on the Bioinformatics and Biophysics/Bioinformatics tracks, contact Chen Keasar[chen.keasar@gmail.com]. For more details on the computational biology track, contact Tal Shay[talshay@bgu.ac.il].