Abstract:
Biocomputational methods can broadly be viewed as information management systems at the interface of mathematics, statistics, computer science, and molecular biology/genetics. The main objective is to use the tools and methods from the disciplines of mathematics/statistics and computer science to turn vast, diverse, and complex life sciences data into useful knowledge. Biocomputational methods branch out to two major areas: bioinformatics and computational biology. These two terms are often used interchangeably but there is a fine line between them. Bioinformatics more closely addresses advancement of algorithmic and computational techniques based on computer science, mathematics and statistics to manage and analyze biological data efficiently. On the other hand, computational biology addresses hypothesis-driven investigation to a biological problem using computational, mathematical and statistical methods.