An advanced interdisciplinary course is allowing graduate students, postdocs, and faculty members to meet world leaders and experts, including a Nobel Prize winner, “and live, eat and breathe” science this summer at UCSB.
Within the lecture halls of the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics (KITP) and the labs of the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI), the new Santa Barbara Advanced School of Quantitative Biology is spotlighting the dynamics of morphogenesis. Morphogenesis is a process that converts the genetic blueprint of a multi-cellular organism into complex physical structure.
Nearly 100 international scientists have come together to collaborate on the topic of animal development for this course, presented by KITP and CNSI, called "New Approaches to Morphogenesis: Live Imaging and Quantitative Modeling." The researchers represent such disciplines as engineering, physics, mathematics, and biology.
"Quantitative biology is really a major construction project in science and so is a very natural focus for an interdisciplinary school," Dr. Boris Shraiman, Susan F. Gurley Professor of Theoretical Physics and Biology, a member of KITP, and a founding co-director of the course, said in a campus news release.
Chemical Engineering Associate Professor Todd Squires is a student in the course. Credit: George FoulshamMichelle Dickinson, a senior lecturer at the University of Auckland and a student in the course, said in the release: "This program is really unique in that it's incredibly interdisciplinary. It's physics combined with biology, and technically I'm an engineer so it combines engineering, too. It's a great place to meet world leaders and experts, and live and eat and breathe the science that we're trying to solve."
"We put together eight core ideas for research projects, but it's really the students that bring this to life," Dr. Joel Rothman, Wilcox Professor of Biotechnology in UCSB's Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology (MCDB) and the other founding co-director of the course, told the UCSB Public Affairs and Communications office.
"The students are driving the research in ways that we wouldn't have even come up with," he added. "They're bringing a lot of fresh ideas, so the synergy that's created by bringing scientists of this broad expertise together creates whole new ventures that wouldn't have been created in a typical course environment."
The student researchers attend lecture-discussions with such distinguished academics as Eric F. Wieschaus, Squibb Professor in Molecular Biology at Princeton University and winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Among other UCSB students and faculty involved in the program are MCDB Professors Denise Montell and Bill Smith; Mechanical Engineering Professor Otger Campas; Chemical Engineering Associate Professor Todd Squires; and Physics grad student TA Nicholas Noll.
Santa Barbara Advanced School of Quantitative Biology receives grant support from Burroughs Wellcome Fund and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. In addition, state-of-the-art imaging systems are loaned to the school by Andor, Coherent, Leica, Nikon, Olympus, and Zeiss. The course is continuing through August 24.
For more information and full details on the course, read the Office of Public Affairs and Communications news release and view the video below.
UCSB's Summer School for Quantitative Biology from UC Santa Barbara on Vimeo.