Undergraduate Bioinformatics Textbook?

Question

[Jashapiro]

Does anyone have a suggestion for a good textbook to teach introductory bioinformatics to undergraduates? I'm looking for something that would be appropriate for biology undergrads who might not have had much if any formal CS or statistics. I found a few online that might be useful, but I can't really find any reviews from people who have used them (students or teachers).

Some of the ones I have come across so far that look promising are:

• Campbell and Heyer, Discovering Genomics, Proteomics, and Bioinformatics
• Pevsner, Bioinformatics and Functional Genomics
• Lesk, Introduction to Bioinformatics

[Nico Adams]

Personally I think the Pevsner book is great. Written in very accessible language and combines theory with practical exercises and more in a very balanced way. And also leads wodnerfully up to the bigger picture....

[Casey Bergman]

Good to see you here Josh. 1-5 on my previous response are good for undergraduates without a quantitative background.

[Andrea_Bio]

having recently returned to this field after a long absence i looked for a good introductory book. I didn't like the Lesk book once i started reading it (although it did look great when i first picked it up). The Campbell book is good but i don't think it is really an 'all round' textbook even though that is its intention. Best one i found was by David Mount - Bioinformatics: sequence and genome analysis.

Answer 1

[Prateek]

This should absolutely be on the list Biological Sequence Analysis: Probabilistic Models of Proteins and Nucleic Acids Richard Durbin, Sean R. Eddy, Anders Krogh, Graeme Mitchison (Amazon Link)

[Jashapiro]

An excellent book, to be sure, but a bit more focused than I was looking for. I want something that covers global expression analysis, the use of some of online databases, etc.

[Burlappsack]

In one day, I saw three co-workers reach for this book in independent events.

Answer 2

[Thaman]

Maybe you are looking for the book like this

Bioinformatics: A Practical Guide to the Analysis of Genes and Proteins

And please go through older post

[Jashapiro]

Thanks for the pointer to the older post.

Answer 3

[Ajene]

Well, might sound strange but this one is a good introduction (i am myself a biologist that does a PhD in Computational Biology now):

Bioinformatics For Dummies, 2nd Edition Jean-Michel Claverie, Ph. D., Cedric Notredame, Ph.D.

Answer 4

[Spitshine]

Take a look at the colorful and example-driven "Understanding Bioinformatics" by Marketa Zvelebil and Jeremy O. Baum. It's been used with bioinformatics undergrads in some programs as an introduction and provides usable teaching material.

[Michael]

We used this for teaching in an undergrad course for non-computer scientists (mainly mol. biologists), I did chapters 9., 10. and can recommend it. It seems like you can sort of teach it chapter by chapter and achieve a good overview of the major different topics in bioinformatics.

[Michael]

I had to lower the level of detail a bit more in the lectures btw

Answer 5

[Pradeep]

This beginner level book covers several databases that could be helpful. Also some introductory bioinformatics and modeling methods are explained. A Cell Biologist's Guide to Modeling and Bioinformatics by: Raquell M. Holmes

Answer 6

[Pradeep]

Other easy to follow books: Bioinformatics Basics: Applications in Biological Science and Medicine, (1st edition.); Hooman H. Rashidi, Lukas K. Buehler

Introduction to Bioinformatics, 1st edition; Teresa Attwood, David Parry-Smith

Answer 7

[Jón Ingi Sveinbjörsson]

If the course includes some programming or algorithms then a good book is

An Introduction to Bioinformatics Algorithms (Neil C. Jones and Pavel A. Pevzner) Amazon.com

Gives a nice overview of some of the basic algorithms used in bioinformatics. You would only have to have a very basic knowledge of programming to be able to use this book.