Bioinformatics & Genomics

About

Research in Bioinformatics and Genomics at UVA uses quantitative methods to describe the behavior of genes, genomes, and biological systems.At the intersection of experimental and computational biology, genomics research involves interpretation and integration of large-scale, genome-wide datasets.

These approaches are being applied to diverse topics in biology and medicine including cancer genomics, human and model organism genetics, epigenetics, and evolution. Active areas of research at the University of Virginia include whole-genome sequencing, cancer genome evolution, disease gene mapping, personalized medicine, gene expression profiling, epigenome mapping, high-throughput functional genetics, genome annotation, protein evolution, and pathway reconstruction.

Genomics and bioinformatics research often requires the development of new techniques, including both experimental protocols and data analysis algorithms, to enable a deeper understanding of complex biological systems. In this respect, the field is entering a new and exciting era; rapidly improving “next-generation” DNA sequencing technologies now allow for the routine sequencing of entire genomes and transcriptomes, or of virtually any targeted set of DNA or RNA molecules.

The exponential explosion of genomic data fueled by these technologies presents an unprecedented opportunity to elucidate the molecular underpinnings of natural variation and human disease, but the sheer abundance and complexity of these data also pose significant and unsolved bioinformatic challenges. The scope of these opportunities and challenges promises to revolutionize biology and medicine.

Faculty

  • Auble, David T.

    Molecular Mechanisms of Transcriptional Regulation

  • Bekiranov, Stefan

    Physical Modeling of Microarray Hybridization; Analysis of Genomic Tiling Array Data; Bioinformatics; Computational Biology; Regulatory Networks

  • Bielinsky, Anja Katrin

    Genome instability syndromes in cancer and immune deficiencies

  • Bochkis, Irina

    Epigenetic and genetic mechanisms underlying metabolic disease

  • Bourne, Philip E

    Data Science

  • Brown, Michael G.

    Natural Killer Cells, Viral Immunity, Genetic basis of host resistance to viral infection, Tumor immunity, Immune cell regulation

  • Civelek, Mete

    Systems Genetics Approaches to Understand Cardiometabolic Traits

  • Farber, Charles R.

    Systems Genetics of Skeletal Development and Maintenance

  • Felder, Robin A.

    Clinical Chemistry and Toxicology. Medical Automation Research. Neurotransmitters, cell surface receptors and intracellular second messengers.

  • Garrett-Bakelman, Francine

    Acute Myeloid Leukemia: molecular and cellular biology events which mediate aberrant epigenetic and transcriptional mechanisms during disease establishment and progression

  • Grainger, Robert M.

    Molecular embryology--gene regulation in cells committed to specific developmental lineages

  • Holmes, Jeffrey W.

    Healing after myocardial infarction, cardiac growth and remodeling, and image-based modeling and diagnosis.

  • Janes, Kevin A.

    Systems-biology approaches to cancer biology and virology.

  • Jiang, Hao

    Regulation of stem cell function and tumorigenesis by epigenetics and biomolecular condensation (phase separation)

  • Kasson, Peter M.

    Physical mechanisms of infectious disease; influenza infection; membrane fusion; antibiotic resistance; molecular dynamics simulation; machine learning.

  • Kendall, Melissa M.

    Bacterial cell signaling, host-pathogen interactions, intestinal pathogens

  • Kucenas, Sarah C.

    The role of glia in the development, maintenance and regeneration of the nervous system

  • Li, Hui

    Gene regulation in cancer, RNA processing; Epigenetic modification; Stem cell and development

  • Loughran, Jr., Thomas P

    Hematologic malignancies; bone marrow disorders; leukemia; large granular lymphocyte (LGL)

  • Manichaikul, Ani W.

    Statistical Genetics, Genetic Epidemiology, Biostatistics, Network analysis

  • Miller, Clint L.

    Genetic variation, Complex diseases, Coronary artery disease, Genomics, Epigenomics, Regulatory mechanisms, Vascular biology, Pharmacology and Physiology

  • Minor, Wladek

    Structure-Function Relationships in Macromolecules; Infectious Diseases and Drug Discovery; Bioinformatics and Big Data; Scientific Reproducibility

  • Naegle, Kristen

    Regulation and function of tyrosine phosphorylation in complex networks

  • O’Rourke, Eyleen Jorgelina

    Obesity and Aging

  • Papin, Jason A.

    Systems biology, infectious disease, cancer, toxicology, metabolic engineering

  • Parichy, David

    Developmental Genetics, Evolution and Regeneration

  • Pearson, William R.

    Protein Evolution; Computational Biology

  • Ratan, Aakrosh

    Genomics, Molecular Evolution, Algorithm Design and Analysis

  • Rekosh, David M.

    Human Immunodeficiency Virus Gene Expression; Human Endogenous Viruses; SARS-CoV-2 Protein Trafficking; Post-transcriptional Gene Regulation

  • Rich, Stephen S.

    Genetic basis of common human disease, including type 1 diabetes, diabetic complications, ischemic stroke, atherosclerosis

  • Sheffield, Nathan

    computational biology & bioinformatics; high performance computing; epigenomics & chromatin; pediatric cancer; computational regulatory genomics; machine learning

  • Sheynkman, Gloria M.

    Proteoform Systems Biology: proteogenomic approaches to uncover the role of proteomic variation in human disease

  • Swiatecka-Urban, Agnieszka

    Regulation of cell-surface stability and intracellular trafficking of membrane proteins in epithelial cells

  • Trinh, Bon Q

    Understanding Protein and RNA regulations of gene expression via chromatin structure in myeloid cell development and diseases

  • Wang, Yuh-Hwa

    Genome instability in cancer and repeat expansion diseases

  • Zang, Chongzhi

    Bioinformatics methodology development; Epigenetics and chromatin biology; Transcriptional regulation; Cancer genomics and epigenomics; Statistical methods for biomedical data integration; Advanced machine learning; Theoretical and computational biophysic

  • Zhang, Tian

    Biochemistry

  • Zunder, Eli

    Single Cell Analysis