Dr. Janet Iwasa
Department of Biochemistry
University of Utah
Salt Lake City, UT

Monday, November 9, 2015
3:00 pm (CT)
3269 Beckman Institute

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a rapid growth in the use of animation as a means to communicate complex biological processes to a wide range of audiences. Using 3D animation software from the entertainment industry, it is possible to synthesize data from diverse sources to create a coherent and contextualized view of how molecular and cellular systems operate. These visualizations have served not only to make molecular concepts more accessible to students and the public at large, but have also proven to be extremely useful for researchers seeking to build and refine their hypotheses. In an effort to make animation tools more readily available to researchers, we have embarked on a project to create a novel molecular biology-centric 3d animation application, called Molecular Flipbook, created specifically for cell and molecular biologists.