Buffalo Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics
Russ Miller
Director, Center for Computational Research
UB Distinguished Professor, Computer Science & Engineering
Senior Research Scientist, Hauptman-Woodward Medical Inst

Recent Biomedical Advances
(Buffalo, NY)
PSA Test (screen for Prostate Cancer)
Avonex: Interferon Treatment for Multiple Sclerosis
Artificial Blood
Nicorette Gum
Fetal Viability Test
Edible Vaccine for Hepatitis C
Timed-Release Insulin Therapy
Anti-Arrythmia Therapy
Tarantula venom
Direct Methods Structure Determination
Listed on “Top Ten Algorithms of the 20th Century”
Vancomycin
Gramacidin A
High Throughput  Crystallization Method: Patented
NIH National Genomics Center: Northeast Consortium
Howard Hughes Medical Institute: Center for Genomics & Proteomics

Animal Models and Preclinical Toxicology

Bioinformatics in Buffalo
Center for Advanced Bioengineering & Biomedical Technologies
UB CAT
$1M/yr NYS
Medical Technologies for Product                            Development & Commercialization
WNY STAR Center in Disease Modeling &                           Therapy Discovery
UB, HWI, RPCI, Kaleida
$15.3M NYS
Software, device development, and drug therapies
Buffalo Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics
UB, HWI, RPCI
$61M NYS
$3M Federal Government
$151 Corporate Funding
$53M/yr Peer-Reviewed Grants

 Buffalo Center of Excellence
in Bioinformatics (BCOEB)
Act as a research, development, education, and economic resource for industries based on bioinformatics, including information technology, biotech, and pharmaceuticals.
Combine state-of-the-art computational facilities with high-throughput experimental facilities to enable the development of new medical treatments.
Develop and exploit new algorithms for data acquisition, storage, management, and transmission.

BCOEB Partners
Core Partners
Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute
Roswell Park Cancer Institute
Corporate Partners
Amersham Pharmacia, AT&T, Beckman Coulter, BioPharma Ireland, Bristol Myers Squibb, Confederation of Indian Industries, Dell, General Electric, Human Genome Sciences, HP, Immco, InforMax, Invitrogen, Pfizer Pharmaceutical,      Q-Chem, Sloan Foundation, SGI, Stryker,        Sun, 3M, Veridian, Wyeth Lederle, Zeptometrix
WNY Business Community

Life Sciences Complex
(Buffalo-Niagara Medical Campus)
UB $52M CoE in Bioinformatics
Research and business partners
225 employees and business associates
150,000 sq ft: 50% labs, 50% computational facilities

Experimental Facilities I
Molecular Targeting Laboratory
Screen 30-50K compounds every 3 months
Apply compound to cell (different genes treated w fluor markers)
Rapidly identify effect on specific gene expression pathways
Gene Expression Laboratory
High-throughput microarray and gene chip
Discover new genes, their functions, and pathways
Proteomics and Molecular Kinetics Lab
Identify molecular targets found in Gene Expression Lab
Disease Modeling Laboratory
In vivo testing (flies, mice, baboons,…)
Gene targeting and genetic mapping facilities

Experimental Facilities II
Bioengineering Support Laboratory
Capabilities in photonics and nano-tech research
E.g., handheld devices to test for diseases
Protein Scale-Up and Purification
High-Throughput Robotic Combinatorial Chemistry/Parallel Synthetic Chemistry Capabilities
Drugs created robotically; Tested for interaction with target protein
Rapid identification of a large number of potential drugs
Public Health and Molecular Pathology
Tissue repositories; disease gene maps; medical informatics
High-Throughput Search Process for Structural Biology
Tests 1536 “chemical cocktails” to determine effective parameters for crystallization

Computational Facilities
Center for Computational Research
Leading Academic Supercomputing Center
High-Performance Computing (9TF; 250TB)
High-End Visualization
Support ~100 Groups in ~25 Depts
$42M Grants; $46M Vendor Support
Education/Outreach/Training
H.S. Summer Program
Host Meetings/Provide Tours
Work with Local Industry & Local Colleges
M.S. Certificate Program in Computational Science

"Dell Linux Cluster"
Dell Linux Cluster
5.8TF Peak; 4036 Processors (PIII 1.2GHz + P4 2.4GHz)
2TB RAM; 160TB Disk
16TB RAID
Dell Linux Cluster
2.9TF Peak; 304 Processors  (P4 2.4GHz)
Myrinet2000
600GB RAM; 40TB Disk
HP/Compaq SAN (Oct, 2002)
25TB Disk
250TB Tape
HP/Compaq 1TF EV7 Alpha System (3/03)

Visualization Resources
Fakespace ImmersaDesk
Portable Systems
SGI 3300W
Access Grid Node
Tiled Display Wall
Onyx2 / Onyx300

Molecular Structure Determination
SnB Software by UB/HWI
“Top Algorithms of the Century”
Critical to Rational Drug Design
Important Link in Structural Biology
Current Effort
Grid
Collaboratory
Intelligent Learning

Antibiotics & Supercomputers
Vancomycin solved with SnB
“Antibiotic of Last Resort”
Original molecular structure required 5 months of computing to solve
(Re)solved in a single day on CCR’s supercomputers

Protein Folding
Ability of proteins to perform biological function is attributed to their 3-D structure.
Protein folding problem refers to the challenge of predicting 3-D structure from amino-acid sequence.
Solving the protein folding problem will impact drug design.

Protein Dynamics
Dynamics of Hemoglobin (Example)
50 Days of Processing on 16 Processors (800 CPU Days)
Key
White – Heme Groups
Red – Phe97
Red – Oxygen (in the subunit at bottom)
Green – His 69 and 101
Blue – Tyr 72
Cyan (Ball) – Water Molecules
Yellow – Helix E/F
Interest
Flip of the Phe97 ring at top
Water movement around Phe97
Heme-heme relative movement

Children’s Hospital CT
3D Reconstruction of CT Dataset
Created with the Visualization Toolkit (VTK) on a Linux Workstation
3D Isosurface Clearly Shows Structure that is Nearly Impossible to Determine from 2D Slices

Miniature Access Surgery

Academic Programs
Master’s Program in Bioinformatics (Sloan)
Advanced Degrees under development
Pharmacometrics, Biophotonics, Computational Chemistry, Molecular Biology
School of Informatics (AT&T curr. dev.)
UB-HWI Dept. of Structural Biology
Complementary Degrees
Canisius College and Niagara University

Contact Information
miller@buffalo.edu
www.ccr.buffalo.edu
www.bioinformatics.buffalo.edu