High-Throughput sequencing (aka Next Generation Sequencing) and Bioinformatics
Question: what do you do? Answer: bioinformatics, computational biology, genomics, rnaomics, transcriptomics and I have a background in molecular biology/genetics (Try putting that on a business card)
Ok, I kind of fell into all of this NGS/High throughput sequencing analysis business since I understood what it meant to work with data from an entire genome. Early RNA genomics focused on tedious and expensive laboratory searching, then computational searches took much of the burden (if you knew what you were looking for). But now… WOW! This now not-so-new type of sequencing is a wonder for RNA underworld research. Thanks to the Illumina (formally Solexa) sequencing platform we have masses and masses of data…but not so many ways to analyse it. Now we can combine both approaches by sequencing the ncRNA in an organism, examining the RNA genes we know about, but also use it to find new RNA genes that have up till now escaped our notice. I also help out with some other transcriptomics and small RNA projects. A bioinformatian nowadays is much in demand.
I have also spent a few years teaching bioinformatics and computational biology (and oh yes, there is a difference) to both biologists and stats/maths students, and I find this rather fun. There is nothing better than taking someone terrified of wiping their computer (and quite frankly you are afraid they are going to do that) and see them analyse data in a server environment. Actually, what is better is seeing them make discoveries! Now that is the joy of teaching.
