Meeting of US-EU Animal Biotechnology Working Group at Hinxton September 12 -13, 2012 for Strategic Planning on Cyber Infrastructure and Trans-Atlantic Sharing of "Omics" Datasets

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This award provides support for travel to the Livestock Genomics meeting and associated workshops at Hinxton, UK. The workshop will focus on developing a strategic plan for "omics" data sharing and innovative analysis using trans-Atlantic cyber infrastructure (CI) collaborations and also provide training of young investigators on the latest bioinformatics and CI tools. An additional novel aspect of this proposal is to bring together researchers from a number of non-model species communities, to discuss sustainable cyber infrastructure development. Technological breakthroughs have commoditized and democratized production of "omics" datasets (such as genomics, proteomics, metabolomics). Analyses of these large datasets are helping in enhancing our understanding of basic biological mechanisms, species evolution, and a full range of other related topics. US and EU researchers are playing the major role in developing these resources and it will be useful to explore mechanisms for improved data sharing. The meeting at Hinxton, UK will focus on the issues related to sharing and analysis of large datasets by fostering collaborations between major cyber infrastructure initiatives in biological sciences from US (iPlant) and EU,(EBI, ELIXIR and allbio). The working group meeting will develop guidelines and explore CI connectivity specifically for data sharing in animals. These activities can be considered synergistic as they are applicable to other US-EU biotechnology working groups dealing with plants, microbes, insects, and marine species. The US-EU ABWG members will help develop a strategic plan whereas the training component of CI and bioinformatics tools will help develop computational strengths among graduate students, post docs, and young investigators especially those from minorities and women. To extend the outcomes and discussion from the meeting, travel support recipients will present a plan for dissemination following the meeting. The invitees include both established and emerging leaders in animal genomics that are both scientifically and culturally diverse. A significant portion of the award funds will be used to support travel for meritorious graduate students and post-docs. Participation in the workshop will help expand diversity and encourage young scientists to stay in science careers and begin to integrate cyber infrastructure, data sharing and bioinformatic paradigms into biology laboratories.