"The goal of this proposal is to set up an interdisciplinary research training in the area of bioinformatics algorithms, that should lead to establishing a new level of expertise in certain techniques, methods and algorithms for handling the ever-increasing volume of biological sequence data (DNA, RNA, proteins). Bioinformatics is one of the flourishing research fields at the Computer Science Department of Ben-Gurion University in Israel, including four four faculty members and numerous growing collaborations with biological partners. In general, Ben-Gurion University is one of the most rapidly developing in Israel and provides a vibrant research atmosphere.Besides extending the range of competences to new research areas and increasing the actual expertise , this training will continue a recently started fruitful and promising collaboration between the applicant and the host institution, and should result in a series of high-level publications and new software tools available to the bioinformatics community. Moreover, the training is expected to lead to further collaborative projects involving the partners of the present proposal."