Iowa State University

BCB Highlights...

• BCB Faculty Seminar
• How to apply to our BCB PhD Program
• BCB Lab - a student research initiative -- read about a recent Science publication.
• BCBio undergraduate program
• BCB Faculty have received a number of grant awards. Read BCB News here.

The BCB Graduate Program

The BCB Graduate Program provides an interdisciplinary research environment where successful collaborations between life science researchers and computational scientists have developed over its nearly 10 year history.

Receive Stipend and Tuition Credits

Choose PhD study in ISU's BCB Graduate program and enter a vibrant learning community supported by world class resources. Entering students enjoy full tuition and health insurance credits, as well as a yearly stipend ranging from $22,000 to $30,000 depending on the fellowship received. Apply by Jan. 15. FAQs to apply.

Outstanding BCB Faculty

Interdisciplinary research is possible at Iowa State in bioinformatics and computational biology because of the many collaborations among outstanding BCB faculty members.

News & Updates

Second Supercomputer at ISU

Below Srinivas Aluru, BCB Faculty member, shows off the 3,200 computer processor cores that power Cystorm, Iowa State University's second supercomputer.

Cystorm, a Sun Microsystems machine, boasts a peak performance of 28.16 trillion calculations per second. Aluru said the new machine also scores high on a more realistic test of a supercomputer's actual performance: 15.44 trillion calculations per second.

That measure makes Cystorm 3.3 times more powerful than CyBlue, ISU's first supercomputer.

Srinivas Aluru, left, and Steve Nystrom have worked for months to connect cables and cooling hoses and otherwise get Iowa State University's second supercomputer up to speed. Photo by Bob Elbert.

"Cystorm is going to be very good for data-intensive research projects," Aluru said. "The capabilities of Cystorm will help Iowa State researchers do new, pioneering research in their fields. Cystorm will help systems biologists build gene networks that will help them understand how thousands of genes interact with each other."

Because of Cystorm, Sun Microsystems will designate Iowa State a Sun Microsystems Center of Excellence for Engineering Informatics and Systems Biology.