Forum:Entering Into Bioinformatics Domain

Question

[Hariharan]

I am basically a computer science student, I am doing a project in bioinformatics. But, I have a very little knowledge about biology.But I am very interested in doing the project. Can you anyone give me useful books in bioinformatics, so that I can improve my knowledge. Basically, I trying to create a phylogenetic tree from a family of protein sequences.

So, give me the names of some useful books related to this. And also, topics which are related to computer science.

I am using Multiple Sequence Alignment algorithm to create consensus sequence from a family of protein sequences, then from that consensus sequence phylogenetic tree has to be created.

[biobot 0.0.77.a.1099]

What books and topics did you find while doing the literature search for your project? In what way were they not useful?

[Michael]

Take a course in bioinformatics at your local univerty and/or read a book, book reviews here: http://biostar.stackexchange.com/questions/181/recommend-your-favorite-bioinformatics-books

Use the search function on this site first, to avoid downvotes and frustration.

[Gjain]

you should google first and also search the previous threads

Answer 1

[Russh]

There is a substantial thread on bioinformatics books here.

Answer 2

[Steve Moss]

These are some pretty cool books on/including phylogenetics

• The Phylogenetic Handbook: A Practical Approach to Phylogenetic Analysis and Hypothesis Testing
• Phylogenetic Trees Made Easy - A How-To Manual
• Molecular Evolution - A Phylogenetic Approach
• Molecular Evolution and Phylogenetics
• Reading the Story in DNA - A Beginners Guide to Molecular Evolution

There is also an excellent paper by T. Ryan Gregory

• Understanding Evolutionary Trees

And these cool blogs/sites too

• http://biophylo.blogspot.com/
• http://rutgervos.blogspot.com/
• http://iphylo.blogspot.com/
• http://treevolution.blogspot.com/
• http://phytools.blogspot.com/
• http://www.davelunt.net/evophylo/
• http://phylogenomics.blogspot.com/
• http://bodegaphylo.wikispot.org/Front_Page
• http://www.r-phylo.org/wiki/Main_Page
• http://cran.r-project.org/web/views/Phylogenetics.html

They should give you all the information you need for understanding the theory behind phylogenetic trees and tree building :-)

[Sudeep]

I didn't realize that there are so many blogs just on phylogeny, interesting

Answer 3

[Zev.Kronenberg]

Google bioinformatics.

Building trees:

http://books.google.com/books/about/Inferring_phylogenies.html?id=GI6PQgAACAAJ

[Michael]

Thanks zev for the link, but can you post a 'neutral' link, we should not endorse a single vendor.

[Zev.Kronenberg]

Still new around here. Thanks for keeping me in line.

Answer 4

[Amr]

first you need to learn phylogenetics, not all of bioinformatics, because thats quite a diverse range of topics!

I am using Multiple Sequence Alignment algorithm to create consensus sequence from a family of protein sequences, then from that consensus sequence phylogenetic tree has to be created.

Im not sure what you mean by this, you need the whole alignment to make the tree, not the consensus! s tree is just a representation of an alignment with some rules about evolutionary distance.