UT MD Anderson Cancer Center
Ken Chen, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
Interested in comprehensively and accurately constructing the genomes and the transcriptomes of various cancer cell populations with a focus on structural variants, towards understanding the heterogeneity and the evolution of cancer as a consequence of the genetics and the environment. He is also interested in correlating genomics with diseases towards identifying biomarkers that are useful for personalized diagnosis and prognosis.
Interested in improving the practice of radiology by more effective utilization of computing resources and data. His research interests include development of radiologist user interface tools, imaging segmentation, search and analytics of the electronic medical record.
Primary research interests are in the role of p53 mutations in oral cancer progression, metastasis and response to treatment.
Arvind U.K. Rao, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
Research Interests: (i) Image Processing; (ii) Image Informatics (extracting quantitative phenotypes from cellular, tissue and radiology images); (iii) Heterogeneous Data Integration (genomics, imaging and clinical data); (iv) Data Mining (formalisms for representation and query of multi-modal molecular data).
Current research interests are: 1) Development of methods and software for the accurate measurement of high-throughput genomic data; and, 2) Development and validation of statistical approaches and software for personalized cancer risk predictions.
Shuxing Zhang, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Experimental Therapeutics
Research interest is to develop new computational methods and strategies that are urgently needed for drug discovery, mainly in three areas: ligand-based drug design, structure-based drug design, and protein structural bioinformatics. Also intensively involved in ADME/Tox modeling, polypharmacology design, and systems chemical biology.
Rice University (A-L)
Matthew Bennett, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of BioSciences
Interested in the dynamics of gene regulation - from small-scale interactions such as transcription and translation, to the large-scale dynamics of gene regulatory networks.
Current areas of interest include: 1. Evolutionary design principles of master level gene expression regulation in bacteria; 2. Networks controlling differentiation and development in bacteria; 3. Mechanisms and dynamics of genetic regulation in Hematopoietic Stem Cells; 4. Spatial organization, signaling and dynamics in bacterial communities; 5. Host-pathogen interactions during active and latent tuberculosis infection; and, 6. Cellular stochasticity, control of noise and stochastic decision making.
Studies data analytics: how to analyze, store, retrieve, and manipulate large and heterogeneous data sets. Within this problem space, most of the work focuses on: 1. The systems-oriented problems that arise when building software to manage large and diverse data sets; and, 2. The difficulties that arise when applying statistical methods to the analysis to such data sets.
We develop computational tools on high-performance systems to model protein structure and function, understand bimolecular interactions, develop new drugs, and help analyze, in the long run, the molecular machinery of the cell.
Research Areas Include: Population Dynamics, Branching Processes, Statistical Genetics, Molecular Evolution and Bioinformatics
Rice University (M-Z)
John T. McDevitt, Ph.D., Professor of Chemistry, Bioengineering, and Materials Science & Nanomaterials Engineering, Department of Chemistry
A long-standing research interest is the science and engineering of hybrid molecular assemblies as applied to sensor and device applications. Research efforts are underway to translate these discoveries into forms that are practical and scalable for use as real-world sensors for humanitarian and civilian applications.
Interested in computational research on topics related to evolution.
Interests are to advance hypoxia research and microvasculature studies, based on three research platforms: 1. biological systems modeling theory and design; 2. hypoxic response signaling; and, 3. neurovascular systems biology.
Research interests use structural biology to investigate a wide range of areas including: 1. Molecular architecture of DNA replication and cancer; and, 2. Defining evolutionary trajectories: Molecular adaptation to stresses such as antibiotics and temperature.
Research interests are in artificial intelligence and machine learning, and their applications in computational systems biology, neuroscience of human learning, assessments of hurricane risks, network analysis of power grids, mortality prediction in cardiology, conflict forecasting and analysis of terrorist networks, and analysis of unstructured text data.
Research interests focus on the theory and practice of Bayesian variable selection techniques and on the development of wavelet-based statistical models and their application.
Research interests focus on automated reasoning, a branch of Artificial Intelligence with broad applications to computer science, including database theory, computational-complexity theory, knowledge in multi-agent systems and computer-aided verification.
The University of Texas Health Science Center
Research Areas Include: Information Retrieval; Consumer Informatics; and, Clinical Decision Support
Research Areas Include: Cell Signaling, Transcriptional Regulation, Genomics and Bioinformatics
Trevor Cohen, M.B.Ch.B., M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Biomedical Informatics
Research Areas Include: Distributional Semantics, Information Retrieval, Knowledge Discovery, Clinical Comprehension and Mechanisms of Error Recovery
Research interest uses computer simulations to study the organization of cell signaling components, interfacial interactions and allostery to aid in the development of treatments for unsolved health challenges. Special focus is on the Ras family of lipid-modified enzymes that regulate a variety of cell signaling pathway and whose malfunction leads to many forms of cancer.
Research interests include: 1. The structure of eukaryotic membranes; 2. Post-translational mechanisms for targeting membrane microdomains; and, 3. Functional diversity in protein transmembrane domains.
University of Houston
Eric Bittner, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Chemistry
Primary research interest is studying the dynamics of molecules in their excited electronic states, using both computational and theoretical approaches.
Timothy Cooper, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Biology and Biochemistry
Research interests center on understanding the processes underlying adaptive evolution. Using bacterial and computational experimental systems, the aim is to identify and integrate these mechanisms and examine how they depend on genetic and environmental factors.
Research interests are in Bioinformatics, Computer Science, Applied Statistics, Mathematical Modeling, Information Theory.
Primary research interests are directed at understanding the role of microRNAs in regulating the transcriptome and epigenome of cancer cells and stem cells with the long term goal of identifying microRNA-gene pairs that are most critical for driving biology and disease.
Research interests include strongly disordered and non-equilibrium systems, with specific applications to materials science, molecular electronics, and biophysics.
Robert Schwartz, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Biology and Biochemistry
Professor in the Department of Biology and Biochemistry and the Director of the Center for Molecular Medicine and Experimental Therapeutic
Current research interests focus on developing various magnetic-based techniques for molecular and cellular imaging and magnetic resonance imaging.
The University of Texas Medical Branch
Research interests involve work in the areas of: 1. Chemical Physics/Physical Chemistry, 2. Biochemistry and 3. Computer Science.
University of Houston at Clear Lake
Liwen Shih, Ph.D., Professor and Chair, Department of Computer Engineering
Research Interests: Parallel Computation-Processors Mapping; High-Performance Computer Architecture; Parallel Algorithms; and, Artificial Intelligence
Houston Methodist
Research involves a wide range of medical and surgical devices, including robotic control tools, powered implantable devices, systems to reduce Intensive Care psychosis, and devices that improve situational awareness and reduce error in critical care environments. Also involved in studies aboard the International Space Station, assessing human adaptation to long duration spaceflight.
Research focuses on understanding health and disease from a systems perspective in order to generate cost-effective strategies and solutions for disease management. Research approaches combine both experimental and high throughput biology with rigorous computational, bioinformatics, biophysics, and imaging methods to achieve a deep understanding of the functions of each component in biological systems and integration of them with multilevel systems analysis.