Course website: http://training.h3abionet.org/IBT_2016/

Venue of course: 19 classrooms across 11 African countries. Classrooms connect to the trainer via Mconf (‘virtual classroom’).

Dates for the course: 6^th July – 9^th October 2016, every Wednesday and Thursday, 10:00-14:00 CAT each day

Course organisers: H3ABioNet Education and Training working group and the IBT core team (Kim Gurwitz, Shaun Aron, Sumir Panji and Nicola Mulder)

Participation via Classrooms: A call was sent out for institutions to apply to host a classroom. Classroom selection was based on the availability of certain infrastructure requirements, as well as the availability of dedicated, local teaching assistants. Classrooms hosted at both H3ABioNet and non-H3ABioNet institutions.

Participants: Participants applied to a particular classroom via a centralised application form and were informed of the outcome of their application.

Course Sponsors: H3ABioNet

Course Overview: The IBT_2016 course is an introduction to the field of Bioinformatics, with a focus on important Bioinformatic tools, algorithms and resources. Over a period of 3 months of intensive biweekly contact sessions, the course combines theoretical and practical sessions to allow participants to gain practical experience in using various tools and resources.

Intended Audience: The course is aimed at individuals from a Molecular Biology background who have a basic understanding of Biochemistry and/or Genetics and would like to become basic Bioinformatics users.

Syllabus and Tools: The participants will cover an introduction to various Bioinformatics topics, namely; Databases and Resources, Genomics, Linux, Sequence alignment theory and application, Multiple sequence alignment, Protein structural Bioinformatics, Phylogenetics and molecular evolution. For practical sessions, web-based tools are used as far as possible.

Prerequisites: A base line level of the understanding of the central dogma of molecular biology (i.e. DNA to RNA to Protein) is a requirement.

Objectives: By the end of the course participants should be able to:
• Explain the use of Bioinformatics
• Name the key Bioinformatics techniques and tools
• Locate important biological databases and retrieve data
• Use selected tools effectively to run specific Bioinformatics analyses
• Understand the strengths and limitations of the various techniques

Course limitations: This course will provide an introduction to the field of Bioinformatics. Participants must be able to attend biweekly contact sessions at one of the classroom sites.

Course costs: There is no application or participation fee. Local sites provide the physical resources for the course and the course core team provides logistic and course management support

IBT_2016 course schedule(*subject to slight changes)