Welcome to the
Computational Biophysics Workshop at Bethesda, Maryland

Helix Systems
Center for Information Technology
Building 12A, Room B51
National Institutes of Health
Bethesda, MD
November 5-7, 2007

Modeling the molecular processes of biological cells is a craft and an art. Techniques like theoretical and computational skills can be learnt by training, but meaningful applications are achieved only with experience and sensitivity. Helix Systems, of the Center for Information Technology at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the NIH Resource for Macromolecular Modeling and Bioinformatics offered a workshop, attempting to teach both the craft and art of modeling through learning by doing. Thirty participants attended the workshop held in Building 12A, Room B51, at the main NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland. Participants learned how to stretch proteins, pull water through molecular channels, mine genomic data, and study their favorite biomolecules. After lectures and discussions in the morning, afternoons were devoted to hands-on computer laboratories where participants delved into over 200 pages of tutorials, on their own laptops or laptops provided for the workshop, all humming with computational biology software, e.g., VMD and NAMD. Workshop supported in part by NIH P41-RR005969 "Resource for Macromolecular Modeling and Bioinformatics".