Ben’s Three Minute Thesis
Are you smarter than a computer?
DNA damage is a persistent problem for our bodies and has the potential to lead to life threatening diseases like cancer. While studying what causes this damage and how it is repaired, researchers are faced with numerous problems comparing and locating specific DNA sequences. These tricky problems require clever solutions that combine both our knowledge of computer science and biology. In this presentation, you will engage with one of these computational problems head on so you can better understand how we discover these solutions and why they matter. It’s time to figure out: Are you smarter than a computer?
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Ben is a fourth-year Ph.D student in the School of Molecular Biosciences. He uses computational methods to study DNA damage and repair, especially in the context of the proteins that manage our genome. He also has a passion for undergraduate education which was fostered by the amazing professors at his alma mater, Whitworth University, and has continued to grow with the many teaching opportunities he has had at WSU.