From Coding the Genome to Algorithms Decoding Life

This RiSE Seminar Talk was held by Jasmin Fisher on March 15, 2012.

ABSTRACT

The decade of genomic revolution following the human genome's sequencing has produced significant medical advances, and yet again, revealed how complicated human biology is, and how much more remains to be understood. Biology is an extraordinary complicated puzzle; we may know some of its pieces but have no clue how they are assembled to orchestrate the symphony of life, which renders the comprehension and analysis of living systems a major challenge. Recent efforts to create executable models of complex biological phenomena - an approach we call Executable Biology - entail great promise for new scientific discoveries, shading new light on the puzzle of life. At the same time, this new wave of the future forces computer science to stretch far and beyond, and in ways never considered before, in order to deal with the enormous complexity observed in biology. This talk will focus on our recent success stories in using formal methods to model cell fate decisions during development and cancer, and on going efforts to develop dedicated tools for biologists to model cellular processes in a visual-friendly way.