Bioinformatic Methods I

The entire course is on coursera for free (minus quizzes and assignments, anything that's graded) so might as well hit that up.

https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-1

https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-2

I am coming from exactly opposite direction: software engineer being fascinated by biology trying to get into biotech industry - so my comment may be skewed that way.

That being said, I tried the aforementioned courses by Johns Hopkins and while they were not bad, they did not really stand out - maybe it's me, but it was just dry enumeration of basic facts, click here, load data there, without much of the deeper reasoning/explanation, to the point that I had trouble to keep my concentration.

I enjoyed much more the Bioinformatics specialization by UC San Diego: https://www.coursera.org/specializations/bioinformatics

It also has a version bit more accessible to people w/o lots of computer science experience: https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics?

As well as external support website with tons of extra exercises and nice hands-on introduction to Python that may get you started: http://rosalind.info/problems/locations/

I also started the specialisation by Uni of Toronto, but at that time, I was lacking needed biology background, so I dropped off. Still, it looked like something definitely worth of checking out: https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-1

Are these going the direction you had in mind or are they going too much into programming?

I started with these courses:

https://www.coursera.org/specializations/bioinformatics

https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-1

https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-2

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Eventually, I discovered MIT Open Courseware – Computational Systems Biology changed my life, but I probably wouldn't start there unless you're super ambitious. And if you are, I'd highly recommend working through it even though it's quite technical (math involved, as should be expected in bioinformatics).

https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/biology/7-91j-foundations-of-computational-and-systems-biology-spring-2014/video-lectures/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJzybEXmIj0

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In practice bioinformatics usually takes advantage of command line programs and R packages. So eventually, you'll need to pick up

1. LINUX/UNIX command line
2. R (is pretty tough, but highly used in bioinformatics)
3. Python is pretty popular too

https://www.biostarhandbook.com/ (Not free but worth the money, good for beginners and intermediates)

Coursera:

https://www.coursera.org/specializations/bioinformatics (more algorithmic, comp sci approach, this might be what you're most interested in)

https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-1 Very beginner level

https://www.coursera.org/learn/bioinformatics-methods-2

https://www.coursera.org/specializations/genomic-data-science (intermediate level, not the best instruction for beginners)

Edx:

https://www.edx.org/micromasters/bioinformatics (I can't comment much about it, haven't looked at material)

Other:

https://software.broadinstitute.org/gatk/ This is from the Broad, and gives an idea of current best practices in clinical bioinformatic analysis.

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Good luck!

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