The International Bologna Master in Bioinformatics addresses these questions and aims to generate knowledge and expertise in specific fields of Biology, Biotechnology and Medicine, where it is fundamental to refer to and retrieve bio-molecular data stored in Biomedical Databases.
In the post-genomic era it is urgent for the advancement of science and of technological application to manage billions of biological data in order to store and retrieve the correct information. Furthermore it is necessary to improve existing methods or alternatively develop new ones for the analysis of genes, genomes, polymorphisms and their correlation to different pathologies.
Presently Biomedical and Biological researches need qualified experts with a cross-disciplinary expertise, able to manage, generate and contribute not only to the rational handling of biological data but also capable of giving contributions to the incremental development of existing data bases with the aim of preserving and transmitting all the richness of information at a molecular level of our and other species.
Bioinformatics includes several applications, as it is evident from the many laboratories that at the University of Bologna are linked to this training program and are willing to accept students for their practical stage and writing of the final thesis.
The curriculum consists of two years: in the 1st year all the basics of Informatics and Bioinformatics are thought; in the 2nd year the students are requested to practice their knowledge in a research field selected among different ones, with the aim of integrating wet biology and computation in one of the many laboratories at the University of Bologna, and/or abroad, where Bioinformatics is essential for research activities.

Starting the academic year 2007-2008 a joint program with the University Pompeu Fabra and the University of Barcelona in Barcelona is also available to obtain a double title in Bioinformatics and Bioinformatics for the Health Science.