Conference: Workshop on Facilitating Microbial Research Through Advanced Data Management Infrastructure to be held October 27-29, 2003 in Arlington, VA

本次研讨会的目的是让科学家们对微生物研究的需求达成相互理解，了解如何通过改进的数据管理基础设施来满足这些需求，并为实施这样的基础设施提供路线图。该研讨会将有助于了解现有的数据管理和知识提取技术，该领域的未来发展方向，以及如何利用它来推进微生物研究。生命科学的最新进展产生了越来越多的科学数据。这些有价值的数据已存储在单独的数据库中。然而，没有有效的机制，让科学家发出复杂的查询，包括多数据库查询。然而，这种机制将大大提高科学家处理和分析数据的速度，压缩从调查到发现的周期。 本次研讨会将汇集受这些众多数据库出现影响的科学家，因为他们定期使用这些数据库来推进微生物研究。此外，讲习班将包括一些对数据库和信息检索感兴趣的信息技术研究人员。 研讨会将邀请来自学术界、工业界和研究中心的发言人。一些演讲者将介绍他们在维护微生物数据库方面的经验，如TIGR综合微生物资源。其他讲者将专注于数据库管理和信息检索问题的最新发展，包括数据库集成，本体和语义网技术。此外，研讨会还将邀请对微生物研究感兴趣的演讲者，这些研究依赖于微生物数据库。研讨会将向数据库研究人员展示微生物研究的挑战，并鼓励他们在开发新的数据管理系统时将这些挑战作为真实的生活研究案例。讲习班将为不同背景的科学家和研究人员交流意见提供一个论坛。研讨会的成果将是对整个微生物生物学领域具有重要意义的数据管理基础设施实施计划。

The objective of this workshop is to allow scientists to reach a mutual understanding of theneeds of microbial research, to understand how these needs can be addressed through animproved data management infrastructure, and to provide a roadmap for implementation of such an infrastructure. The workshop will facilitate the understanding of the available data management and knowledge extraction technology, the future direction of this field, and how it can be used to advance microbial research. Recent advances in the life sciences have resulted in an increasing amount of scientific data. This valuable data has been stored in separate databases. However, there are no efficient mechanisms that allow scientists to issue complex queries including multidatabase queries. Yet such mechanisms would considerably improve the rate at which scientists process and analyze the data compressing the cycle from investigation to discovery. This workshop will bring together scientists who are impacted by the emergence of these numerous databases, since they use these databases on a regular basis to advance microbial research. In addition, the workshop will include a number of researchers in information technology with interests in databases and information retrieval. The workshop will feature speakers from academia, industry and research centers. Some of the speakers will present their experience in maintaining microorganism databases such as the TIGR Comprehensive Microbial Resource. Other speakers will focus on the state of the art in database management and information retrieval issues including database integration, ontologies and semantic web technology. Furthermore, the workshop will include speakers with interests in microbial research that relies on microorganism databases.The workshop will expose database researchers to the challenges of microbial research and encourage them to use these challenges as real life study cases when developing new data management systems. The workshop will provide a forum for an exchange of ideas from scientists and researchers with different backgrounds. The outcome of the workshop will be a data management infrastructure implementation plan of importance to the entire field of microbial biology.