Introduction to Bioinformatics

Life in a post-genomic age has the promise to revolutionize our understanding of how our genes shape who we are, how our genome evolved, and how we function. There are new possibilities for an improved quality of life as we exploit new knowledge to design novel, more effective drugs. Central to these possibilities being realized is one of the most important information-gathering, data-mining, and knowledge-building tools in current research and healthcare development: bioinformatics. An Introduction to Bioinformatics introduces students to the immense power of bioinformatics as a set of scientific tools. The book explains how to access the data archives of genomes and proteins, and the kinds of questions these data and tools can answer: how to make inferences from the data archives, to make connections among them, and to derive useful and interesting predictions. Blending factual content with many opportunities for active learning, Introduction to Bioinformatics offers a truly reader-friendly way to get to grips with this subject, making it the ideal resource for anyone new to the field.