Study Applied Bioinformatics at Cranfield
Over the past few years, bioinformatics has become the most exciting field in biology. This MSc course provides a unique hands-on learning experience in bioinformatics skills, by combining the latest advances in analysing high-throughput genomic, transcriptomic and metabolomics data. Cranfield’s Bioinformatics MSc is the first of its kind in the UK. With more than 200 alumni over the past 10 years, it became the most popular postgraduate course in bioinformatics in Europe. Because Cranfield is a solely postgraduate university it means that every single taught module of the Applied Bioinformatics MSc is uniquely tailored to be master's level. That’s why it is the winner of the BBSRC’s Master's Training Grant (MTG) award for the best course in life sciences. Our taught modules cover in great depth a plethora of programming languages typically applied in bioinformatics, such as Perl, Java, R and SQL, as well as modern web technologies, such as JavaEE, NoSQL and JavaScript. Furthermore, we have two dedicated taught modules focusing on established bioinformatics protocols for the latest next generation sequencing (NGS) and 3rd generation sequencing (3GS) technologies.Overview
- Start dateFull-time: October, part-time: October
- DurationOne year full-time, two-three years part-time
- DeliveryTaught modules 40%, group project 20%, individual research project 40%
- QualificationMSc
- Study typeFull-time / Part-time
- CampusCranfield campus
Your career
Industry, alumni and current students talk about Bioinformatics at Cranfield
Bioinformatics is a fast-growing field that offers progressive career opportunities for forward-thinking people who are ready to grasp the challenge; people who understand both the biological and computing aspects of this science.
Our MSc opens doors to careers in industry, public research establishments, and university research. The multidisciplinary nature of our course has allowed our students to follow diverse career paths in various medical-related sectors.
Successful graduates have been able to pursue or enhance careers in a variety of key areas such as:
Pharmaceutical and biotech companies, plant research institutes, food sector, public institutions, bioinformatics, IT companies.
Cranfield Careers and Employability Service
Our Careers and Employability Service can help you find the job you want after leaving Cranfield. We will work with you to identify suitable opportunities and support you in the job application process for up to three years after graduation. We have been providing master's-level training for over 20 years. Our strong reputation and links with potential employers provide you with outstanding opportunities to secure interesting jobs and develop successful careers. The increasing interest in sustainability and corporate and social responsibility has also enhanced the career prospects of our graduates.
Previous students have gone on to jobs within prestigious institutions including:
The Sanger Institute, The European Bioinformatics Institute, Institut National du Cancer (France), Centro de Investigación Prínciple Felipe Ií (Spain), GlaxoSmithKline, PubGene, Tessella, UCB, the Wellcome Trust, Inpharmatica, Invitrogen, Oxford Gene Technology, Cancer Research.
Others have chosen to continue their research training by undertaking a PhD either at Cranfield or elsewhere.
Cranfield graduates are very successful in achieving relevant work. For professionals already in the industry, Cranfield qualifications enhance their careers, benefiting both the candidate and their employer.
I chose Cranfield because of the connections it has. I looked online and they said they're connected to all these different businesses and I thought, wow. Cranfield has helped me grow more confident and Cranfield has made me happier. The people, they have been really lovely. I've gotten on with every single one, we've all helped each other out. Everybody's in the same boat, everybody's interested in the same thing.
Consider the MSc in Applied Bioinformatics at Cranfield as an investment in your future. That is what I did when choosing the programme. I was attracted by the diverse portfolio of courses offered. All were directly supporting timely and relevant market skills. I was delighted with this investment as it directly empowered me in the course of my employment and career.
The course is kept up-to-date, and thus we're developing skills that are valued nowadays in the labour market. I'm sure that it will increase my chances of finding an interesting job. Furthermore, the fact that some lectures are given by external experts gives a better insight of what a bioinformatician's work looks like, which helps to choose one of several possible career paths.
Having a background in biological sciences and an interest in mathematics and technical aspects of biology made me interested in studying bioinformatics as it combined both my interests with biology as well as my technical ability. The reason I chose to study at Cranfield University was because of the outline of the course, it takes you through many different types of software languages but also aims this towards a biologist with no previous software experience, which fit me perfectly.
Why this course?
1. The only Bioinformatics MSc in the UK offering a truly bespoke postgraduate experience
Cranfield University is the only solely postgraduate university in the UK, which means that every single lecture and practical session within the Applied Bioinformatics MSc is tailored to master's level. Unlike other Bioinformatics MSc courses you may come across, you won’t be sharing any modules or lectures with other undergraduate students or MSc courses. This gives our Applied Bioinformatics MSc a truly tailored postgraduate experience.
2. A variety of programming languages
Experience taught us that there is no such thing as a single preferred programming language in the field of bioinformatics. Every programming language has its strengths and advantages depending on the task in hand. For example, Java can be quite powerful if you are developing a visualisation and/or standalone application, while R and Python are excellent choices for machine learning and statistical analysis. Perl, on the other hand, is a very easy programming language to learn by biologists and forms the foundation of most of the legacy tools and frameworks developed for the human genome project, and still being used to date. This is why the Applied Bioinformatics MSc is the only course in the UK that offers three dedicated programming modules as part of the taught component, covering R, Java and Perl. Furthermore, other programming languages such as Bash, JavaEE, SQL, JavaScript and Python are also comprehensively covered. This means that upon the completion of this course, you won’t only have the skills and expertise to develop optimised bioinformatics tools for various tasks, but you will also find it relatively much easier to learn new programming languages that were not covered during the course as you will have the foundation in interpreted, object-oriented, and statistically-focused languages.
3. A truly NGS- and 3GS-focused course
Analysing sequencing data from the latest sequencing platforms such as Illumina® Pacific Biosciences ® and 10x Chromium® nowadays is a standard skill required for most bioinformatics jobs (a quick search on LinkedIn for bioinformatics jobs should prove this!) This is why the course includes two dedicated modules on analysing sequencing data. The first module, 'Next Generation Sequencing Informatics', focuses on preprocessing and analysing Illumina® short-reads sequences for performing sequence alignment, gene expression profiling using RNA-Seq, and genotyping for variant discovery. The second module, 'Advanced Sequencing Informatics and Genome Assembly', provides hands-on experience in performing de-novo sequence assembly using short and long-reads sequencing data, as well as providing computer practical sessions in developing and optimising your own assembler using the overlap-layout-consensus (OLC) and de-bruijn-graph (DBG) algorithms.
4. Industrial and research applications
Drug discovery: Applications of bioinformatics in drug discovery is not only covered in the Applied Bioinformatics MSc course but is an integral part of the delivery of the course. Leading experts from multinational pharmaceutical industry such as Enrico Ferrero (GSK) and Lee Larcombe (nexaSTEM) are core members of the teaching team of this course and actively deliver several lectures and hands-on computational practicals. These industrial partners also offer a number of thesis projects for our students each academic year.
Plant genetics: The Bioinformatics Team at Cranfield University works very closely with the Agrifood theme, which includes the Crop Water Use and the Plant Science Laboratory Groups. The Course Director has an established track record as PI or CoI several plant genetics-focused research projects. If plant genetics and food security is your research of interest, you will be given the opportunity to join one of our research team for your thesis project.
Infectious diseases: We have a long-term ongoing collaboration with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM). Together, we work closely in establishing a molecular understanding of several infectious and tropical diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria and Chagas disease. Each year, we offer three to four research MSc thesis project placements for our Bioinformatics students to work closely with LSHTM’s world-renowned leading experts on one of their ongoing research projects. Over the past few years, we published a number of research articles based on such thesis projects. Our MSc students were either the leading or co-authors on these.
This MSc is supported by our team of professional thought leaders, including Professor Andrew Thompson who is influential in this field and an integral part of this MSc.
Informed by industry
Cranfield University benefits from the input of a group of world-renowned experts in a range of applied sciences including bioinformatics. We lead and collaborate in diverse research and consultancy projects, both nationally and internationally.
Our collaborators include:
• GlaxoSmithKline
• London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
• Queen Mary University of London
• Unilever
• Sanofi Aventis
• Rothamsted Research
• The European Bioinformatics Institute
• University of Athens
• Cambridge University.
Course details
The taught programme is generally delivered from October until March and comprises eight compulsory taught modules, a group project and an individual thesis project. Students on the part-time programme will complete all of the compulsory modules based on a flexible schedule that will be agreed with the Course Director.
Course delivery
Taught modules 40%, group project 20%, individual research project 40%
Group project
Watch our Applied Bioinformatics group project video
Real-life experience
Working in project teams is part of everyday working life. It requires not only your individual expertise but also an appreciation of the skills of the other members of the team. This part of the course gives you the opportunity of working as part of a team on a group project. This is an invaluable experience that will help you to recognise and implement the differing contributions that colleagues bring to team work, and the different roles that we can choose to play within a team.
Individual project
Industry-related projects
A four-month thesis project carried out either at Cranfield or an external research establishment or commercial organisation within the UK or Europe, this gives you the chance to concentrate on a subject area of particular interest to you, perhaps in collaboration with the type of organisation that you are hoping to find employment with.
Real-life problem-solving thesis projects
Our MSc students finalise their hands-on study practice with individual thesis projects that solve problems in multidisciplinary areas whilst working under academic supervision. Some recent projects include:
- Development of a web-based resource for tuberculosis genotyping and diagnosis from whole genome sequencing data: PhyTB
This project by Ernest Diez (2013-2014) is focused on creating PhyTB - an application for the interactive study of variation in M.tuberculosis using data from the PhyloTrack library.
- Applications of data science and machine learning in detection of meat adulteration
This project by MSc student Rafal Kural (2014-2015) is focused on the application of machine learning methods to unravel hidden patterns of meat samples using Fourier transform spectrometry, gas chromatography mass spectrometry, high performance liquid chromatography and VideometerLab. Over the course of this work, it has been proven that it is certainly possible to obtain very accurate detection of meat adulteration, reaching sample adulteration level prediction accuracy of 100% for GCMS and 90-97% for FTIR and VM data.
Modules
Keeping our courses up-to-date and current requires constant innovation and change. The modules we offer reflect the needs of business and industry and the research interests of our staff and, as a result, may change or be withdrawn due to research developments, legislation changes or for a variety of other reasons. Changes may also be designed to improve the student learning experience or to respond to feedback from students, external examiners, accreditation bodies and industrial advisory panels.
To give you a taster, we have listed the compulsory and elective (where applicable) modules which are currently affiliated with this course. All modules are indicative only, and may be subject to change for your year of entry.
Course modules
Compulsory modules
All the modules in the following list need to be taken as part of this course.
Introduction to Bioinformatics using Python
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This module provides a general introduction to bioinformatics and fundamentals of programming. The module covers the programming basics required by students in order to program in Python, which is nowadays becoming one of the most popular programming languages in the bioinformatics community; and its application in retrieving, parsing and visualising biological sequence data. |
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Exploratory Data Analysis and Essential Statistics using R
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This module aims to provide you with an overview of important concepts in statistics and exploratory data analysis. The module introduces the main concepts in analysing biological datasets using the R environment, as well developing bespoke scripts for multivariate analysis such as principal component analysis and hierarchical clustering. |
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Next Generation Sequencing Informatics
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To introduce you to the techniques that have given rise to the genomic data now available and develop skills and understanding in the bioinformatics approaches that facilitate evaluation and application of these data. Over the past decade, Next-generation DNA Sequencing (NGS) technology has been a huge stimulus for a lot of breakthrough discoveries in biology. This module provides an overview of many core types of NGS projects, including latest protocols in genomic and transcriptomic analyses, genotyping and variant calling as well as detailed hands-on practical sessions of our best practice data-analysis workflows. |
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Application of Bioinformatics in Epigenetics, Proteomics and Metagenomics
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To provide you with the knowledge of the current trends in analysing epigenomic, proteomic, and metagenomic data and to demonstrate its principles, challenges, and complexities in bioinformatics. |
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Machine Learning for Metabolomics
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Programming Using Java
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To introduce you concepts of object oriented programming using Java. Java is the pre-eminent programming language for serious application development on the Internet. The module covers Java data objects of primitive and reference data types and introduces you to the basic fundamentals of programming in Java, with hands-on practical sessions on implementing simple programs using calculations, variables, control statements and loops. |
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Data Integration and Interaction Networks
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Data integration represents a major challenge for bioinformatics research. This module covers the most popular data management, integration and visualisation tools within the bioinformatics community as well as the main concepts of databases design and normalisation. |
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On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Advanced Sequencing Informatics and Genome Assembly
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This module aims to develop a system-level view of biological systems and their response to various internal and external factors, through the integration of advanced NGS and 3GSsequencing data with functional annotation using established concepts of graph theories widely applied for various assemblers such as de-Brujin and Overlap-layout consensus. This module gives an insight on the details of omic-scale/big-data-driven life science making use of core platform technologies. |
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| Intended learning outcomes |
On successful completion of this module you should be able to:
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Teaching team
You will be taught by an expert multidisciplinary team both from Cranfield University and externally.
Cranfield lecturers include Dr Fady Mohareb - Course Director, Admissions Tutor, and lecturer in Bioinformatics, and Tomasz Kurowski - Research Assistant in Bioinformatics.
External lecturers include Professor Conrad Bessant - Professor of Bioinformatics, QMUL; Dr Enrico Ferrero - Scientific Leader at GSK; Dr Lee Larcombe - Applied Exomics Ltd Director; Dr Robert King - Bioinformatician at Rothamsted Research; and Dr Luca Bianco - Bioinformatics Research Scientist, Fondazione Edmund Mach.
Who is it for?
This course aims to equip graduate scientists with the computational skills and awareness needed to process, analyse and interpret the vast amounts of biological data now becoming available. This course is equally suitable for candidates from life sciences disciplines who aim to gain the programming and computational skills through this course, and graduates with IT/computer science background who want to gain the molecular biology understanding to become bioinformaticians.
On completion of this course, you will be able to apply information technology and computational techniques to process genomic and genetic data, as well as developing novel drug discovery and diagnostic tools.
Additionally, you will gain the skills to design and implement software tools and databases using the latest advances in standalone and web-based technologies to fulfil the need of the research community.
How to apply
Applications need to be made online. Click the 'Apply now' button at the top of this page.
Once you have set up an account you will be able to create, save and amend your application form before submitting it.
