MATLAB and Simulink for Biological Sciences

Scientists and engineers in the life sciences industry use MATLAB and Simulink for multidisciplinary and end-to-end workflows.

With MATLAB, you can:

  • Create classification and predictive models for health analytics
  • Automate image analysis tasks such as cell counting
  • Develop bioinformatics analysis workflows without needing to code using apps
  • Use extensive statistics capabilities to determine significance in studies
  • Engage with a community of developers who have solved similar problems
  • Create plots and reports for tabular data
  • Acquire live data from individual instruments, cards, sensors, or Internet of Things approaches

“MathWorks tools allowed us to thoroughly explore our data, understand it, and put together an optimal data analysis approach.”

Dr. Lorenzo Leonardi, Institute for Biodiagnostics, Canada

App-Based Workflows

App-based workflows with MATLAB support advanced development for scientists of all programming abilities. Using apps, scientists can explore data, make predictive models, segment images, fit curves, and create visualizations all without writing a single line of code. At the end of most workflows, these apps can automatically create documented code, which performs the same actions that come from GUI interaction to create a robust pipeline. In this way, non-programmers can perform workflow development, and other users can augment the code base as needed.

App-Based Workflows

Active Community Development

Active Community Development

There is an international community of biologists that are developing and sharing tools for a wide array of disciplines. Hundreds of code examples and toolboxes for life sciences are available on File Exchange as well as numerous third-party products and services.


Third-Party Tools

  • CERR – Toolbox for medical physics image processing and treatment planning
  • COBRA – Toolbox for biochemical constraint-based analysis
  • GIBBON – Toolbox for biophysics analysis
  • Lobster – Framework to analyze large microscopy images
  • matRad – Toolbox for radiation modeling in medical physics

Learn More

Wide Acceptance and Applications in Life Sciences

Scientists worldwide rely on MATLAB and Simulink across various life science fields and applications, including commercial, research, and education. MATLAB also supports interdisciplinary work and workflows. Integrating various toolboxes with MATLAB enables scientists to synthesize genetic, image, time-series, and cloud data and transport data types directly from one toolbox to another.

Wide Acceptance and Applications in Life Sciences

MATLAB biological sciences ecosystem is widely used in these fields:

In addition to the fields listed above, scientists and researchers use MATLAB and community-supported tools across other disciplines. Explore third-party products and services for biological sciences on File Exchange.