Using Bioinformatics to Develop and Test Hypotheses: E. coli-Specific Virulence Determinants.

Bioinformatics, the use of computer resources to understand biological information, is an important tool in research, and can be easily integrated into the curriculum of undergraduate courses. Such an example is provided in this series of four activities that introduces students to the field of bioinformatics as they design PCR based tests for pathogenic E. coli strains.