Teaching

Since the foundation of the Center, Saarland University has offered a six-semester bachelor's curriculum and a four-semester research-oriented master's curriculum in bioinformatics. Both curricula are organized by the Center. The bachelor curriculum conveys a broad spectrum of topical knowledge and the foundations required for entering professional practice. The master's curriculum builds on the first professional degree (bachelor) and conveys deeper topical knowledge, preparing students for sophisticated activities in industry or for PhD study.

Teaching is performed by members of the three faculties participating in the Center and several collaborating institutes. The subject areas include mathematics, informatics, bioinformatics, chemistry, biology and pharmaceutics. The core bioinformatics topics are taught by faculty from the depoartments of the full professors Helms (biology), Lenhof (informatics), Keller (medicine, and Lengauer (MPII). In addition, Prof. Verena Wolf (informatics), Junior Professor Tobias Marshall (informatics) and the junior research group leaders Dr. Marcel Schulz (informatics),Dr. Nico Pfeifer and Dr. Olga Kalinina (MPII) contribute to core bioinformatics teaching.

The bachelor's courses are delivered in German. Generally, our students are highly interested in both methodical (informatics/mathematics) and life sciences topics. About half of the beginners come from Saarland, the other half mostly from the rest of Germany. Students are free to configure their individual study profile with a focus more on informatics or on biology . Most of the graduates from our bachelor's program remain in Saarbrücken and continue with the master's program. A few students choose to continue with the master's program for biotechnology at Saarland University.

The master's courses are delivered in English and targeted at graduates from our bachelor's program as well as to graduates from comparable curricula in Germany and abroad. Our master's curriculum is internationally well-reputed and is expecially popular with applicants from Asia. In previous years, the number of accepted external applicants was comparable with that of our bachelor's graduates. Thus, the group of students in our master's program has a highly international profile.

The graduates of our master's program are nationally and internationally in high demand for PhD studies at leading research institutes and universities. About two thirds of all graduates continue with their PhD. The remaining third moves directly into industry or the service sector, in Saarland or elsewhere in Germany.