Bioinformatics for Biomedical Science and Clinical Applications

Summary

This book provides biomedical researchers and students with a state-of-the-art assessment of the application of bioinformatics to biomedical science and clinical applications. Contemporary biomedical and clinical researches are constantly pushed forward by the rapid advancement of various high throughput technologies on all the DNA, RNA and protein levels. These technologies include, for example, the advanced genome sequencing technology, microarray, ChIP-Chip and mass spectrometry. These technologies enable researchers to conduct investigations on human health and disease in a systematic, genome-wide scale. Technologies were developed and improved in order to have the capability of generating vast amounts of raw data. Bioinformatics methodologies have therefore been in great demand to unleash the power of these technologies for basic biomedical science and clinical applications.

Human samples are of primary importance for biomedical and clinical studies. In addition, animal samples are often useful to illustrate common molecular mechanism shared between many mammals, including humans. Pathogen-infected samples are also valuable for deciphering their role in human diseases. A new type of sample adds a new dimension of complexity.

The book demonstrates what the cutting-edge technologies can do and how to design an appropriate study and prepare samples for the study. The book then shows how to adequately handle large volumes of raw data to address specific high-level clinical questions. Finally, the book shows how to integrate heterogeneous data for drawing novel conclusions. The real challenges lies in the integration and interpretation of a complex source of information for a holistic view of human in health and disease: this will be a main feature of this book. The main purpose of this book is to train researchers and students for the thrust of biomedical sciences in the 21 century.

Key Features

• A coherent presentation of concepts, methodologies and practical tools that systematically lead towards significant discoveries in the biomedical and clinical area
• Real examples of cutting edge discoveries
• Includes both basic biomedical science and clinical applications
• Introduction of study types and technologies for all the DNA, RNA and protein levels
• An emphasis of systems biomedical science featuring the integration and interpretation of a heterogeneous source of information

Content

• General introduction - from basic science to clinical applications; from study design to data analysis
• The human genome - introduction; sequence alignment; genome annotation; genome variations and diseases; SNP association and genome-wide association studies; gene-gene interactions; computational epigenomics The human transcriptome - introduction; RNA secondary structure; gene expression data analysis; time course data analysis; micro RNA and RNAi
• The human proteome - introduction; mass Spectrum data analysis; protein structures ; protein-protein Interactions
• Systems biomedical science - introduction; multivariate statistical analysis; meta analysis; pathway and biological networks; functional computational biology
• Conclusion

Readership

Researchers and postgraduates in biology, bioinformatics, medical informatics, immunology, pharmaceutical industry academic and clinical researchers in the field of bioinformatics, human biology, medicine, computational biology and computer science; practitioners in sequencing centers, biotech, biopharmaceutical and pharmaceutical companies.

Author

The author, Dr Kung-Hao Liang, is a senior bioinformatician. He works at the Liver Research Center, LinKo Medical Center, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, R.O.C. Taiwan on the power of genomics and systems biology to fulfil unmet medical needs. He has written a wide variety of publications, on genomics and medical areas. He currently serves on the editorial board of the BMC Journal of Clinical Bioinformatics.