Faculty Directions, Spring 2004 - Blackboard: Bioinformatics Workshop Held in Mexico with Materials on CU Network

Felix Barron
Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition

Editor's Note: This academic year, Clemson University faculty, students, and staff have the opportunity to use one of the three course management systems. Their reporting of their experiences will help determine the one course management system that is selected for the future. This article on Blackboard and articles by Philip McGee and Clint Isbell on WebCT and by Chris Piper on MyCLE illustrate the innovative ways faculty are using these course management systems.

In August 2003, I teamed with the Institute for Biomedical Sciences at the University of Juarez, Mexico, to teach a week long bilingual bioinformatics and biotechnology workshop to 18 scientists from across Mexico. Chemical engineers, computer scientists, chemists, biotechnologists, biologists, medical doctors, and agricultural engineers were among the participants.

Mexico has been working in the biotechnology areas for over 15 years, major Mexican universities offer biotechnology programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and research institutes are working on all sorts of projects related to transgenic plants, genetic identification of shrimp species, mapping pathogenic bacteria, and developing diagnostic tools by using genomic information.

Mexico is also in the process of establishing an institute for genomic medicine (INMEGEN). A country with about 60 different ethnic groups, Mexico is preparing for the future by utilizing information provided by the already published Human Genome.

The purpose of my workshop was to provide an understanding of the principles of bioinformatics to solve biological and biotechnological problems. The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) defines Bioinformatics as the field of science in which biology, computer science, and information technology merge to form a single discipline. The ultimate goal of the field is to enable the discovery of new biological insights as well as to create a global perspective from which unifying principles in biology can be discerned.

Students were able to extract their own mitochondrial DNA for study. Their extracted DNA was sequenced by the DNA Learning Center, and was used as material for a bioinformatics laboratory exercise.

A Clemson University certificate was given to all participants attending the workshop. The top two students, based on their online quiz grades, were also given a CU T-shirt.

The bioinformatics workshop was a success, due in part to the assistance of Justin Tanner, a recent Clemson graduate, who worked with me to manage the computer technology side of the workshop. This was my first time to use the course management system Blackboard. Educational Technology Services assisted me in providing guest IDs for the participants in Mexico so they could access the workshop materials in Blackboard the same way Clemson University students access their courses.

Using Blackboard was a good experience for everyone involved. Participants were favorably impressed that they could access the workshop materials and take an online quiz on Clemson's network when we were all in Mexico. Their guest IDs were valid for 30 days, which allowed them time to review the workshop materials after the workshop and download any materials they wanted to keep.

Currently, I am using Blackboard to make a variety of materials, such as FDA analysis information for new products, available to food processing and packaging companies in South Carolina . Companies have guest IDs that allow them access to the Blackboard tools and materials I've posted until mid-May.

The bioinformatics workshop and other similar projects fit very well under the biotechnology and biomedicine emphasis area being pursued as one of the niche areas by Clemson University . Anyone interested in more information may call me at 864-656-5694.