<!doctype html public "-//W3C//DTD W3 HTML//EN">
<html><head><style type="text/css"><!--
blockquote, dl, ul, ol, li { padding-top: 0 ; padding-bottom: 0 }
--></style><title>Re: planning for panel on Quantitative
Biology</title></head><body>
<div><br></div>
<div>Please respond if you are interested in being part of organising
an hour long</div>
<div>discussion panel on 'Quantitative Biology' designed for both
the</div>
<div>engineering and biology crowd. We will also arrange for some
postdiscussion</div>
<div>food to encourage informal discussions. The panel will also give
you an</div>
<div>opportunity to moderate the questions and discussion. The
tentative time line</div>
<div>for the event is december-january since we have sponsors who
would</div>
<div>support this time frame. if you are interested, please email me
back, and plan to</div>
<div>join us at the organisational meeting this friday in Bldg.
68-365.</div>
<div>The meeting time is flexible - we can discuss over email.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Motivation for the panel:</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>In the post-genomic era, there is an urgent need for
engineering</div>
<div>tools and techniques to manage complex data and derive
meaningful</div>
<div>non-intuitive hypothesis. Several recent examples of steps to
integrate</div>
<div>engineering and biology has brought deep insights into</div>
<div>biology. Instead of listening to individual achievements of</div>
<div>such research endeavours as talks, organising a panel to
discuss</div>
<div>would explore into the problems and solutions necessary for</div>
<div>succesful integration. The goal is to help biologists learn
from</div>
<div>engineers and vice versa.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>To get this moving -</div>
<div>a) there are some boiler plate letters that we can send do invite
a</div>
<div>few prof in the Boston area to discuss on the cutting-edge
findings</div>
<div>and futuristic ideas for the field. This should be very
straightforward.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>b) We could also advertise it across student communities since it
is a</div>
<div>field newly added to undergrad curriculum in various
universities.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Cheers,</div>
<div>Viji (please respond directly to me - viji@mit.edu)</div>
<hr>
<div><br>
Viji M. Draviam<br>
Research Scientist<br>
Bldg 68-365, Department of Biology<br>
Massachusetts Insitute of Technology<br>
Cambridge MA 02139</div>
<div>http://web.mit.edu/viji/www/</div>
</body>
</html>