Systems and Synthetic Biology

Modules shown are for the current academic year, and are subject to change depending on your year of entry.

The programme is only offered as a full-time, one-year course and leads to the MRes degree. Students begin their lecture programme with compulsory core modules and practicals in the first term (October–December).

In January you will choose a topic for the eight-month long multidisciplinary, theoretical or experimental research project, supervised by at least two supervisors with different expertise. One supervisor may also come from industry.

During January students write a research proposal (6 pages) on their chosen research project, evaluated by a student mock panel for early feedback prior to submission to supervisors. During terms 2 (January-March) and 3 (April-June), a mini-conference will be offered.

This short lecture module introduces the basics of modelling and theoretical analysis, tailored towards students from the life sciences with limited theoretical background. In particular, lectures will cover differential equations and stochastic simulations.

Computer practical - the programming package Matlab will be introduced. Students will learn how to read data files, analyse data, fit models to data, plot graphs, print to output files, and how to implement simple dynamical models.

This short lecture/tutorial module will provide an introduction to life sciences, tailored towards students from the physical sciences. Lectures will discuss aspects of molecular biology and information flow within a biological context (DNA, RNA, proteins, transcription and translation). An overview of some experimental techniques (cloning, PCR) will be provided.

In addition to the basic introduction to biology, some insight will be provided into up-to-date DNA assembly methods which have applications in synthetic biology and will be of interest to students with life science backgrounds.

Hands-on experience in basic experimental techniques will be provided. The practical will explore new techniques in DNA assembly.

Lectures will cover signalling and gene regulatory pathways and programmes in bacteria, mammalian cells and plants. Further topics of the lectures will include structural and functional genomics, molecular medicine and experimental techniques.

This lecture module will cover various modelling techniques, including dynamical systems, networks, deterministic differential equations, stochastic simulations, control theory, biophysics and cell mechanics, as well as statistical approaches such as Bayesian inference.

Topics range from biological building blocks and their characterization as, e.g. input/output relations, filters, amplifiers, robustness, as well as control theory, metabolic flux analysis, and genetic engineering. Additionally, this module will address social, ethical and policy issues, such as how is science linked to society, biology in the political context, social challenges, governance and regulation.

This short lecture module will cover imaging and high-throughput technologies. Imaging techniques include various forms of fluorescence microscopy, and high-throughput techniques include RNAi screens, microarrays, and microfluidic devices.