Wing Ki (Catherine) Wong

This was the final module of the year – and perhaps one of the most relevant modules (although this was only one-week long!) since the majority of us need to speed up our algorithms at some points in our research projects for some forms of screening.

One more week until Easter break!
This week we had an intensive one-week course on C++. Since I have used C++ in one of my previous projects, I opted to do the assignment straightaway. It was on class inheritance for different Ordinary different equation solvers, and running CxxTest to assert warnings if the code failed to behave as expected – according to the instructions given on the assignment (one should be reminded that, even when the code runs, ie. when miracle happens, it might not run according to the specification as we thought we had coded). It was fairly useful suite if you know what you should expect (in my case, the boundaries/end points data).

After four weeks of Mathematical Biology, I decided to switch to a chemistry course to explore something drastically different. In Structural Biology, modelling takes a different approach. In the previous module of Structural Biology, we had been exposed to the experimental methods and a tiny bit of physics behind solving for the crystal structures of proteins using X-ray crystallography, and how the structures are realised computationally. This module then provides the subsequent development in terms of using these crystal structures (or using the pharmacophore structures) to aid drug design. The overall idea is to predict the way proteins interact.

This is a 4-week course on different families of mathematical modelling techniques, ranging from statistical modelling to Ordinary differential equations, from analytical to numerical techniques of solution.

Yet another course on applied statistics. We had lectures and practicals on Phylogenetics, Haplotype Phasing, Statistical alignment and population genetics (depicting how geographical migration evolves the genetic composition for the well-adapted species to prosper). Additionally, we spent indeed most of our time on an intense group project – we had only until Thursday to finish up theoretical reading, coding and presentation!