Biological Engineering Programming
MIT's BE.180 uses problems drawn from biological engineering to teach structured computer programming and the design of complex systems. Students build programming skills through exercises that model biological processes, working through concepts in algorithm design, data structures, and software construction while applying them to engineering problems in biology. The course, part of MIT OpenCourseWare, includes a syllabus, lecture materials, and problem sets developed for MIT's Department of Biological Engineering. Materials are free to access online under MIT's open license, with no certificate offered. It suits students who want an introduction to programming grounded in biological applications rather than a general computer science curriculum, and it assumes little prior programming background, building foundational skills through hands-on assignments tied to real biological engineering scenarios.