Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
‘Bioinformatics and Computational Biology’
constitute a newly evolving highly interdisciplinary science
within the context of ‘Translational Medicine.’ Conceptually, this
new interdisciplinary approach is rooted in life sciences while
pulling other specific disciplines such as mathematics, physics,
computer science and engineering, biology, and behavioral science.
It is exciting for the scientists to see this level of
transformation and integration across several disciplines of the
sciences within a short period of time. Although ‘Bioinformatics
and Computational Biology’ are distinct and independent
disciplines, each maintain close interactions with life sciences
to realize their full potential.
Bioinformatics encompass information sciences and technologies to
construct the vast, diverse, and complex life sciences data in a
way that is more understandable, easily interpretable and
scientifically useful. On the other hand, computational biology
uses mathematical and computational approaches to address
theoretical and experimental questions in biology. Although
bioinformatics and computational biology are distinct, there is a
significant overlap of activity at their interface between the
two.
The Definition by the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
The NIH Biomedical Information Science and Technology Initiative
Consortium has agreed on the following definitions of
bioinformatics and computational biology recognizing that no
definition could completely eliminate overlap with other
activities or preclude variations in interpretation by different
individuals and organizations.
Bioinformatics: Research,
development, or application of computational tools and approaches
for expanding the use of biological, medical, behavioral or health
data, including those to acquire, store, organize, archive,
analyze, or visualize such data.
Computational Biology: The
development and application of data-analytical and theoretical
methods, mathematical modeling and computational simulation
techniques to the study of biological, behavioral, and social
systems.
Translational Medicine
One of the greatest accomplishments of modern sciences and at the
end of the 20th century is the ‘Human Genome Project,’ which has
revolutionized how we can diagnose and treat diseases. The Human
Genome Project has transformed biology, which is now referred to
‘Systems Biology.’ We now have the ability to look for differences
and similarities between all the genes of multiple species. From
these studies (
comparative genomics),
we can draw specific conclusions about genetic susceptibility and
pre-disposition, differences between the species and about the
evolution.
DNA microarrays technologies designed to measure the relative
number of copies of a genetic message (levels of gene expression)
at different stages in development or disease or in different
tissues have gained highly significant importance in Translational
Medicine.
Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D., NIH Director, states that we are in a
revolutionary period of medicine that calls for the four Ps:
Predictive, Personalized, Preemptive and
Participatory. He believes that this new concept requires
patient involvement well before disease strikes. In his opinion,
the future is going to be patient-centric and proactive as opposed
to the doctor-centric, curative model of the past. It must be
based on education and communication. This model also applies to
developing countries, including India.
Systems Biology
Systems Biology represents a newly emerging approach, which is
centered on the model that one can study biological systems by
delineating the relationships of all of their component elements
and understand the resulting systems properties. Systems Biology
is: a) providing a road map for integrating various disciplines
such as ‘
Genomics, DNA Microarrays,
Proteomics, Metabolomics, Pharmacogenomics and Drug Discovery;
b) looking at biology of the system as a whole by integrating with
informational science from the various parts of life sciences and
other disciplines such as mathematics, physics, computer science
and engineering, and behavioral science; c) catalyzing the
emergence of biological information (e.g., rapid DNA sequencing or
DNA chips), and bringing in medical informatics. The integration
of science is also occurring very rapidly at the ‘clinical trials’
level potentially leading to new and more effective drugs for
diagnosing and treating various diseases in a more predictive and
personalized manner. This profound conceptual systems biology
framework will provoke changes in medicine—moving us toward a
predictive, preventive, and personalized
medicine in the world.
Activities
The Institute is actively developing relevant activities within
the context of Systems Biology and Translational Medicine. The
Institute has a major interest to develop educational modules that
are based on the Translational Medicine model. In addition, the
Institute is also actively pursuing partnerships and
collaborations with outside organizations. Some of our activities
may include the following:
• Develop disease databases and tools for clinical trials and
clinical data management (CDM) for developing new drugs within the
context of Translational Medicine. The overall framework for
‘Predictive, Personalized, Preemptive and
Participatory medicine’ will dramatically change how we
will diagnose and treat diseases even in developing countries,
including India.
• Improve content and utility of databases.
• Develop better tools for data generation, capture, and
annotation.
• Develop and improve tools and databases for comprehensive
functional studies.
• Develop and improve tools for representing and analyzing
sequence similarity and variation.
• Create mechanisms to support effective approaches for producing
exportable software that can be widely shared.