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

WNY Biomedical Advances
PSA Test (screen for Prostate Cancer)
Avonex: Interferon Treatment for Multiple Sclerosis
Artificial Blood
Nicorette Gum
Fetal Viability Test
Implantable Pacemaker
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
UB Center for Advanced Bioengineering & Biomedical Technologies
$1M/yr NYS
Med Tech for Product Dev & Commer.
Center 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

 Buffalo Center of Excellence
in Bioinformatics
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
University at Buffalo
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

Center for Computational Research
High-Performance Computing and High-End Visualization
70 Research Groups in 27 Depts
25 Companies and Institutions
Ext Fund: $108M; Vendor: $41M
Sample Areas
Computational Chemistry
Ground Water Modeling
Geophysical Mass Flows
Urban Visualization and Simulation
Medical Imaging
Networked Multimedia
Training
Workshops; Courses
Degree Programs

Computational Resources
Dell Linux Cluster - #22 in world!
600 P4 Processors  (2.4 GHz)
600 GB RAM; 40 TB Disk
Dell Linux Cluster - #187 in world
4036 Processors (PIII 1.2 GHz)
2TB RAM; 160TB Disk; 16TB RD

Visualization Resources
Fakespace ImmersaDesk R2
Portable 3D Device
VREX VR-4200 Stereo Imaging Projector
Portable projector works with PC
Tiled-Display Wall
20 NEC projectors; Dell PCs; Myrinet; 15.7M pixels
Access Grid Node
Group-to-Group Communication
Commodity components
SGI Reality Center 3300W
Dual Barco’s on 8’´4’ screen

Antibiotics & Supercomputers
Vancomycin solved with SnB (UB/HWI)
SnB: “Top Algorithms of the Century”
“Antibiotic of Last Resort”
Original molecular structure required 5 months
(Re)solved in a single day on CCR’s supercomputers
Current Efforts: Grid, Collaboratory, Intelligent Learning

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

3D Medical Visualization App
Collaboration with Children’s Hospital
Leading miniature access surgery center
Application reads data output from a CT Scan
Visualize multiple surfaces and volumes
Export images, movies or CAD representation of model

Multiple Sclerosis Project
Collaboration with Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center (BNAC)
Developers of Avonex, drug of choice for treatment of MS
MS Project examines patients and compares scans to healthy volunteers

Multiple Sclerosis Project
Compare caudate nuclei between MS patients and healthy controls
Looking for size as well as structure changes
Localized deformities
Spacing between halves
Able to see correlation between disease progression and physical structure changes

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