Discovering Biology in a Digital World

Welcome to Discovering Biology in a Digital World!

Digital Bio FAQs

What is digital biology?

Digital biology is biological research that involves computers.

Why do you call yourself a digital biologist and not a bioinformaticist or computational biologist?

Because I use bioinformatics to do biology.  In many places, bioinformaticists are programmers and computational biologists are mathematicians.  I am neither.  For a more detailed discussion, see "A biologist by yet another name".

Who can do digital biology?

Anyone can do it; amateurs, professionals, students. Doing digital biology mostly requires an internet connection, a willingness to explore, and a passion for discovering new things.

What is the hardest thing about digital biology?

There's a lot of reading involved and many strange new words. It can also take quite a bit of time if you plan to thoroughly investigate a story and publish your results.

What kinds of topics will I find here?

Bioinformatics and computational biology
• Bioinformatics activities for students, teachers, and anyone who's interested
• My experiences (and occasional frustrations) with digital biology research
• Examples of ways that people use digital biology to discover new things

Biology and biology-related topics, such as:
• Biotechnology
• Chemistry
• Evolution
• Genetics
• Immunology
• Microbiology
• Macrosopic things: Animals, Birds, Insects, Reptiles, Plants, etc.
• Microscopic things: archea, bacteria, single-celled eucaryotes, viruses, etc.

Education
• Cool science resources on the web
• Cool science articles or books that I've read, or movies that I've seen
• Science education
• Bio-Link
• biotechnology education

Weird Science
• Science-related topics that are weird, fun, or just plain silly

Where do I find past writings?

Check out the DBDW archives

How can I find out about updates, new teaching materials, and workshops?

Subscribe to this blog and/or follow me on Twitter (@digitalbio).

Where can I learn about the teaching materials that were developed through your NSF-funded projects?

Many of our teaching materials are freely available from the Tutorials page at www.DigitalWorldBiology.com. Learn about our student and instructor guides for Exploring DNA Structure and the Exploring DNA Structure CD-ROM from our product section and about Molecular Momentos from the ordering section.

You can also download selected publications.

I want to take (or arrange for) a professional development workshop. Where can I find out about your classes?

I teach a semester long on-line bioinformatics course for Austin Community College.  You can take this course from anywhere in the country.

Where have you worked and what are your credentials?

I have a Ph.D. in microbiology from the University of Washington and spent some time as a post-doc research, at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. In 1991, I left my post-doc position to run a biotechnology training program at Seattle Central Community College. SCCC was (and still is) a wonderful place. I got to design and teach lots of fun courses, like Immunology, Genetics, Microbiology, Biotechnology and Society, Bioinformatics, and of course, lots of lab classes like Media and Solution Preparation, Recombination DNA Technology, Protein Purification, Immunochemistry, and Tissue Culture.

SCCC left me with a lasting respect for community college students and some insights into teaching, student learning, and biotechnology education.

One of the most important things that I learned was that certain concepts were really hard for students to pick up. Reflecting back on my own experiences as an undergraduate and graduate student, I realized that there were a lot of things about molecular biology that didn't gel in my mind until I started sequencing DNA and working with the sequences. I reasoned that if working with sequences helped me understand molecular biology, maybe working with sequences would help my students, too.

It dawned on me that the bioinformatics programs and databases coming on-line might supply the missing link that would help a greater number of students really start to grasp molecular biology.

I quit my tenured position at the community college, joined a bioinformatics company (Geospiza, Inc.), and got funding from the National Science Foundation to work on developing activities and labs that would help students learn about biology by using bioinformatics programs and public databases.

Now I wear multiple hats. I do some bioinformatics consulting, write instructional materials that incorporate bioinformatics into biology learning activities, do a bit of research, test out software, and teach classes for college instructors, high school teachers, and college students in using bioinformatics tools for doing biology.

Disclaimer:

The opinions I post are my own. I cite references when I can. If you want more information on the purpose of the site and how I choose links, etc., feel free to check out my earlier post on Evaluating website information.