Using Rosetta@Home, a program that runs on the personal computers of 150,000 volunteers worldwide, David Baker’s team predicted the structure of a 112-amino-acid protein from scratch.
When nature folds an amino acid sequence into a protein, it usually knows that just one conformation is the right one. But when a computer tries to do the same thing, it often predicts multiple...
Jan, 01, 2008
Modelers are using recent gains in computational power to consider the complex interactions of hundreds or thousands of macromolecules at once--a necessary first step toward whole cell simulation
Molecules in cells behave like people in crowded subway cars. Because they can barely budge or stretch out without bumping into a neighbor, they move more slowly, smush themselves into more compact...
Apr, 01, 2011
The Principal Investigators weigh in
Ever since the National Institutes of Health (NIH) began funding the National Centers for Biomedical Computing (NCBCs) just over seven years ago, these powerhouses have been plugging away, building...
Feb, 29, 2012
Exploring the current state of connectomics--in the midst of hype
Connectomics is having a moment. Following on the heels of genomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, metabolomics, and microbiomics, the latest “omic” to seize the spotlight is generating...
Jun, 20, 2013
The first four National Centers for Biomedical Computing take off
WHY NATIONAL CENTERS?
Four National Centers for Biomedical Computing were launched by the NIH in 2004 with $20 million in funding for each center over five years. The reason: We need to make...
Jun, 01, 2005
One of our goals at Biomedical Computation Review is to create a sense of kinship among members of this very diverse community of researchers. This column provides reviews of some of the latest and...
Jun, 01, 2005
Navigating the oviduct and other mysteries
The essential elements of human fertilization are clear: sperm swim through the uterus, travel up the fallopian tube, and fertilize an egg. Not as well understood are the the nitty-gritty details of...
Jun, 19, 2013
Molecular simulation of the ribosome
Inside a cell, the ribosome deciphers genetic codes to produce proteins at unfathomable speeds. Now, researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) have simulated this complex nano-machine in...
Apr, 01, 2006
For proteins, structure information leads to an understanding of function. The same turns out to be true for ribozymes, ribosomal RNAs, and some other recently discovered RNAs. But mapping out that...
Mar, 01, 2009
How Simbios' state-of-the-art software tools are contributing to high-impact biomedical research
Simbios began with a simple idea: that physics-based simulation of biological structures at all scales could benefit from a
unified tool-building effort.
At the same time, the thinking went,...
Oct, 01, 2009