Course outline:

The course will aim to discuss the organisation and evolution of bacterial genomes and the networks that read the information contained in these genomes. This will include the following areas:

 1.          A historical overview of human understanding of bacteria and their place in the tree of life

Bacterial genomes - and the minimal functions for cellular life, properties of gene and protein sequences, genome sizes and scaling laws (*)

Bacterial species and gene phylogenies (*)

What makes a genome - information and “junk” (*)

Forces underlying the evolution of bacterial genomes - mutation, genome reduction and genome growth (*)

Organisation of bacterial genomes (*)

Reading genomes - transcription, transcriptional networks and their evolution

(*) Sections will include some hands-on bioinformatics sessions

Course outcomes:

Understand and analyse basic properties of bacterial genomes
Understand sequence-conservation-function relationships for bacterial protein sequences
Understand the evolutionary forces underlying the content of genomes
Understand the process of transcription and gene regulation and how these interplay with genome organisation

Instructor: Aswin Sai Narain Seshasayee

Schedule: Monday, Wednesday, Friday - 11:30 to 1:00pm

Venue: LH-2