Arkansas Bioinformatics Network

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The Arkansas Bioinformatics Network was the seed for the emergence of MCBIOS.  At present, this network consists of various researchers from the University of Arkansas at little Rock (UALR), the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS), National Center for Toxicology Research (NCTR), and the Arkansas Children’s Hospital (ACH).  These researchers have strong computer engineering and computer science backgrounds and are bioinformatics-oriented expertise in genomics, proteomics, biostatistics, and/or mathematics. They are eager to collaborate with researchers from other fields and to finding innovative solutions for research challenges. A goal of the Network is to integrate faculty at the lead institutions, thereby forming a critical mass of specific expertise within the state that can then help UGI project leaders.  

The following network investigators are particularly strong in the INBRE’s research focus areas.

Computer/information science

Jung Kim, Ph.D. (UALR): Dr. Kim's current research is to predict transcriptional regulatory elements associated with classes of developmentally regulated genes in Dictyostelium discoideum through the dynamic programming matching technique.  Dr. Kim has more than 80 publications in refereed journals and conference proceedings in the areas of bioinformatics, genetic algorithms, and neural networks.

Weida Tong, Ph.D. (UAMS/NCTR): Dr. Tong is Director of the Center for Toxicoinformatics at NCTR, and is an adjunct professor in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at UAMS.  He has over 13 years of research experience in bioinformatics and chemoinformatics, and has published more than 60 papers in these fields. Currently, he is leading an effort to develop bioinformatics approaches that will support genomics, proteomics, and metabonomics research at NCTR.

Biostatistics

Bill Baltosser, Ph.D. (UALR): Dr. Baltosser has been teaching graduate and undergraduate biostatistics and bioinformatics at UALR for the past 14 years.  He has over 20 years of direct experience in integrating bioinformatics into research—his own, that of undergraduate and graduate students, and in work with governmental agencies.  As an editor and reviewer, he has been acknowledged for his contributions to one of the current leading biostatistical texts and for evaluating the suitability for publication of numerous biostatistical manuscripts.

Paula Roberson, Ph.D. (UAMS): Dr. Roberson is Director of the Division of Biostatistics in the UAMS College of Medicine and Interim Chair of the Department of Biostatistics in the UAMS College of Public Health.  Dr. Roberson and other UAMS biostatisticians in her unit collaborate on a number of federally-funded, peer-reviewed projects with significant bioinformatics components.  She is an elected fellow of the American Statistical Association and is a frequent reviewer of NIH proposals and journal submissions with bioinformatics aspects.

Pippa Simpson, Ph.D. (UAMS/ACH): Dr. Simpson is a Professor of Pediatrics and Director of the Division of Biostatistics at Arkansas Children’s Hospital.  Her research interests include microarray data analysis, controlled clinical trials, and data reliability.

Mario Cleves, Ph.D. (UAMS): Dr. Cleves is a senior biostatistician at the Department of Pediatrics UAMS and at the Arkansas Center for Birth Defects Research at Arkansas Children's Hospital.  His wide range of research interests includes genetic and geriatric epidemiology. 

Life sciences (including genomics and proteomics)

Charlotte A. Peterson, Ph.D. (UAMS): Dr. Peterson is the founder and Director of the UAMS Microarray Core Facility, which requires intensive bioinformatics support for image analysis, data mining, and statistical evaluation.  This Core facility is an important resource for using bioinformatics in gene expression profiling.  In her research on molecular mechanisms regulating muscle mass, she is examining the changes in gene expression profiles of muscle stem cells using mathematical models to describe the gene networks involved.  Additionally, she provides numerous research projects to potential bioinformatics students at all levels.  

Kevin Raney, Ph.D. (UAMS): Dr. Raney oversees the Proteomics Facility at UAMS. In this facility, proteins are separated by 2-dimensional gel electrophoresis and 2-dimensional liquid chromatography and then identified by mass spectrometry.  These techniques rely on the ability to search large databases of protein sequence information to match the experimental data to known proteins.  He is also developing methods to identify protein–protein interactions by establishing protocols for preparing and identifying chemically modified proteins by mass spectrometry.

Robert J. S. Reis, Ph.D. (UAMS): Dr. Reis has been conducting research on polygene mapping and other bioinformatics aspects of genetics for over 12 years, and on early events in cancer etiology for 24 years.  Among his 138 publications are five on molecular evolution, four on high-throughput analytical techniques, six on gene mapping, and eight on the inference of function from gene expression patterns. He has chaired a dozen symposium sessions at national and international meetings, including five on gene identification and mapping, and has been an invited speaker 37 times, of which 14 concerned gene-mapping informatics.

William Slikker, Ph.D. (UAMS/NCTR): Dr. Slikker is Director of the Division of Neurotoxicology at NCTR.  He has more than 25 years of research experience in toxicology, risk assessment, and bioinformatics, and has published over 260 papers in these fields.  Currently, he is leading an effort in the application of genomic and proteomic approaches to solve neurotoxicological problems in adult and developing animal models.  Dr. Slikker is President-Elect of the MCBIOS.

Larry Suva, Ph.D. (UAMS): Dr. Suva is Director of the Center for Orthopaedic Research at UAMS.  In collaboration with the Arkansas Breast Cancer Research Program, he has developed a core facility for protein biomarker characterization using surface-enhanced laser desorption/ionization (SELDI).  This facility is a resource for researchers to develop techniques for identification of disease biomarkers.   His own research focuses on models for osteomyelitis, arthritis, and osteoporosis.

 

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