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(Bluefield)— When Bluefield State College computer science major Cynthia Barnes enrolled in the College’s initial cyberinfrastructure course this semester, her career goals centered upon network administration/network security opportunities. Now, several weeks into the course, she’s developed such an interest in cyberinformatics that she hopes to obtain a student internship at Virginia Tech’s Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) where she will pursue a master’s degree in the emerging new field that combines science and technology.
In fact, Barnes’ explanation of cyberinfrastructure, written as an assignment during the BSC course, was so much on target and understandable that VBI will devote an article featuring her response in the next issue of its newsletter.
Cyberinfrastructure is a relatively new term for research environments in which advanced computational, data acquisition and management services are made available to researchers through high-performance computer networks. “The base technologies of cyberinfrastructure are computation, storage, and communication,” she wrote. “The whole point. . . is to revolutionize what people can do, how they can do it, and who participates by enabling them to share and collaborate over time and over geographic, organizational, and disciplinary distance.” This integrated, efficient approach to data sharing and use makes cyberinfrastructure of compelling importance, she added. “Without the base technologies, there wouldn’t be much progress. Time and money would be wasted,” Barnes observed.
Following an intensive summer of training and planning, BSC offered its first-ever course in cyberinfrastructure and bioinformatics this semester. The hybrid course (cross listed as Computer Science 490 and Biology 490) is being taught both live and through the Center for Applied Research [CART] “Course Management System,” combining the best mix of actual classroom instruction with web-based learning.
“This is an exciting, tangible step forward in demonstrating our course, following several months of collaboration between selected Bluefield State College faculty and representatives of the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) and Galileo Magnet High School in Danville, VA,” explained Bruce Mutter, CART Director. “The training (underwritten by a $250,000 grant from the National Science Foundation) focused upon designing an introductory course in bioinformatics and cyberinfrastructure.”
The course helps students from a diverse array of academic backgrounds—including mathematics, biology, computer science, and engineering, learn more about bioinformatics. Bioinformatics derives knowledge from computer analysis of biological data. Research in bioinformatics includes method development (cyberinfrastructure) for storage, retrieval, and analysis of the data. Bioinformatics is a rapidly developing branch of biology and is highly interdisciplinary, using techniques and concepts from informatics, statistics, mathematics, chemistry, biochemistry, physics, and linguistics. It has many practical applications in different areas of biology and medicine.
The collaborating entities involved in the cyberinfrastructure course at BSC will demonstrate and assess the new course for continual improvement, broaden access of high school and collegiate undergraduate students to advanced computing technologies, and encouraged trained students to pursue careers in “informatics.”
October 5, 2006
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