Rockwell Dennis Hunt Scholastic Award Application

The Rockwell Dennis Hunt Scholastic Award honors USC graduate students whose undergraduate degree is from USC. The $5,000 award is bestowed at the USC Honors Convocation in April. Applicants must meet the following criteria:

• Earned a bachelor’s degree at USC within the last five years (2014 - 2018)
• Completed at least three years of undergraduate work at USC
• Currently working towards a master’s or doctoral degree at the University of Southern California during 2018-2019

Applications are due through to the Graduate School by Friday, December 7, 2018 at 5pm. The online application is available here: https://goo.gl/forms/pjklsFf2g9bDnzdf2.  One letter of recommendation must be email to gradfllw@usc.edu by Friday, December 7, 2018 at 5pm.

Chateaubriand Fellowship for PhD students

The Chateaubriand Fellowship is a grant offered by the Embassy of France in the United States. Every year, it allows doctoral students enrolled in American universities to conduct research in France for 4 to 9 months. Chateaubriand fellows receive a stipend, a round trip ticket to France and health insurance.

Deadline: January 8, 2019 at 12pm (noon) EST for fellowships starting during the 2019-2020 academic year.

   Appel Chateaubriand 2019-2020 - En by uscbiscgrad on Scribd

Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society Student Recognition Awards

The USC Chapter of Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society invites applications for PKP Student Recognition Awards for the 2018-2019 academic year.  These awards are open to students in all schools at USC, both graduate students and undergraduates, for original works of scholarship or creative arts.

Students must be registered at USC this fall and their applications must be endorsed by a faculty member.  Details are on the attached flier and application form.

Four awards are announced each year at the annual Honors Convocation in the spring.  Student recipients receive $500 in addition to the prestige associated with the award. The submission deadline is December 5, 2018.

   PKP 2018 Student Awards Submission Package by uscbiscgrad on Scribd

Computational Biology Colloquium | Assaf Zemach, Ph.D.

Assaf Zemach, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer, Tel Aviv University
Staff Profile

Epigenetics in multicellular organisms: a lesson from gene body methylation in honey bee

Thursday, November 15, 2018
2 PM
RRI 101

Abstract: DNA methylation regulates the genome and plays a fundamental developmental role in many eukaryotes. Its epigenetic characteristics allow organisms to memorize stimuli conditions through cell divisions. While DNA methylation is mostly known for its role in transcriptional silencing, recent studies found methylation to be targeted inside sequences of actively transcribed genes, thus termed gene body methylation. Gene body methylation is a common, robust, conserved, and an essential epigenetic phenomenon that exist in many animals and plants. Abnormalities in gene body methylation characterize 50% of all cancers. However, despite all these characteristics, the biological roles of gene body methylation remain the subject of continued debate. Robust non-genic methylation in vertebrates perplex the identification of specific genic methylation effects. To overcome this, we study the role of gene body methylation in honey bee, which similar to other invertebrates, target methylation exclusively to actively transcribed genes. In my talk, I will present data suggesting that 1) gene body methylation stabilizes, rather than alters, transcription during development; 2) genic methylation can oscillate in multicellular organisms as long as it is being kept at an adequate level to preserve its function during development and its pattern across generations; 3) genic methylation is a conserved regulator of animal nervous systems.

Host:  Remo Rohs

Research Assistant at Boston Children’s Hospital

   BostonChildrensHospital ResearchAssistant Job Posting October2018 by uscbiscgrad on Scribd

Faculty Positions at Harbin Institute of Technology

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Computational Biology Colloquium | Vikas Bansal, Ph.D.

Vikas Bansal, Ph.D.
University of California, San Diego
School of Medicine
Dept. of Pediatrics
Lab Website

“Haplotype-resolved whole-genome sequencing using short reads and long reads”

Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018
2 PM
RRI 101

Abstract: Humans are diploid and long-range haplotype information is crucial for genetic mapping in Mendelian and complex disorders, population genetics analyses, and for the complete interpretation of variants in individual genomes.  However, the short read lengths of sequencing technologies such as Illumina limit the ability to reconstruct haplotypes for individual genomes. We have previously developed state-of-the-art computational tools for haplotype assembly from sequence data. We have also demonstrated that chromosomal-spanning haplotypes for human genomes can be assembled using our haplotype assembly tool, HapCUT, applied to proximity-ligation (HiC) sequence data. Recently, we have developed a computational method that enables haplotype-resolved variant detection directly from error-prone long reads generated using the Pacific Biosciences SMRT technology. This method has high precision and recall for single nucleotide variants (0.994 and 0.974 respectively), significantly better than existing variant calling methods, and can enable variant calling in segmental duplications with high sequence identity that are inaccessible to short reads.  We are also working to enable accurate and complete haplotyping using short read Illumina sequencing. Using data from four human genomes sequenced using a novel HiC protocol, we have assembled highly accurate whole-genome haplotypes. Our results demonstrate that haplotype-resolved whole-genome sequencing is feasible using both long and short read technologies and likely to become routine in the near future.

Host: Mark Chaisson