A two-week workshop workshop/short course will be held at the University of Washington, Friday Harbor August 20th -September 3rd, 2000. The course will acquaint students with a modeling approach and software in the context of how biologists can use such tools to explore the evolutionary potential of developmental mechanisms. The first half of the course will cover background information that is crucial to young investigators working in the evolution of development (EvoDevo). This will include: major conceptual issues in evolutionary theory; evidence of evolvability from analysis of fossils and morphology; use of sequence data to infer phylogeny; and paradigms of developmental mechanics (i.e. networks of interacting genes). The second half will focus on modeling gene networks and the use of Ingeneue to do so.
Molecular biology is providing ever more detailed maps of developmental mechanisms as a first step in understanding development. The problem is, however, that these maps are so complex that even when a network is known well, human intuition and language cannot predict or even comprehend its dynamic behavior. The informed, careful use of computer models can help complete maps of gene networks, test the plausibility of those maps as explanations and direct efforts toward inconsistencies among the known facts. This course is a first step in providing biologists with a minimum of training in the use of software towards that end.
