This domain emphasis will no longer be offered after Spring 2022. Any student wishing to declare or change to this domain emphases must submit their declaration or change request to Data Science Advising by Friday of the last week of Spring 2022.

Students interested in this area who will declare after Spring 2022 are encouraged to consider the domain emphasis in Computational Methods in Molecular and Genomic Biology.

This domain emphasis will prepare students for work or graduate school in bioinformatics or computational biology.  Students with this emphasis will be able to understand how computational methods are used to elucidate the mechanisms of cellular processing of genetic data and will prepare them for computational analyses of DNA and other molecular biological data.

From the lists shown below, students will select one course from the lower-division, and two courses from the upper-division. The lower division course is a required element of the Domain Emphasis.


Courses in this domain emphasis are often restricted by major to enroll, and several have extensive prerequisites. It may be difficult to complete this emphasis given these restrictions. Students are advised to make appropriate alternate plans.

 Prerequisites are shown within square brackets.

Lower Division (select one)

  • BIOLOGY 1A. General Biology Lecture (3 units) [Prerequisite: CHEM 1A; Co-requisite: BIOLOGY 1AL]

  • BIOLOGY 1B. General Biology Lecture and Laboratory (4 units)

  • MATH 53. Multivariable Calculus (4 units)

Upper Division (select two)

  • BIO ENG 131 or C131. Introduction to Computational Molecular and Cell Biology (4 units) [Prerequisites: BIO ENG 11 or BIOLOGY 1A, COMPSCI 61A or ENGIN 7]

  • BIO ENG 134. Genetic Design Animation (4 units)

  • BIO ENG 145. Introduction to Machine Learning in Computational Biology (4 units)

  • CMPBIO C131. Introduction to Computational Molecular and Cell Biology (4 units) [Prerequisites: BIO ENG 11 or BIOLOGY 1A, COMPSCI 61A or ENGIN 7]

  • CMPBIO 156. Human Genome, Environment, and Public Health (4 units)

  • COMPSCI 176. Algorithms for Computational Biology (4 units) [Prerequisites: COMPSCI 70, COMPSCI 170]

  • MATH 127. Mathematical and Computational Methods in Molecular Biology (4 units) [Prerequisites: MATH 53, MATH 55]

  • MCELLBI 137L. Physical Biology of the Cell (3 units)

  • INTEGBI 161. Population and Evolutionary  Genetics (4 units) [Prerequisites: BIO 1A, BIO 1B, MATH 10A/16A]


These courses are no longer expected to be offered, but are still accepted for the domain emphasis for those students who have previously completed them:

  • BIO ENG 144. Introduction to Protein Informatics (4 units)

  • MCELLBI 146. Topics in Computational Biology and Genomics (4 units) [Prerequisites: COMPSCI 61A or equivalent]

Unit values and prerequisites are subject to change. Please refer to guide.berkeley.edu for the most up-to-date course information.