New meeting place for bioinformaticians in Norway

Read Norwegian version of the article here.

Although there are established environments for bioinformatics at some institutions, there has been a lack of national meeting places since the Norwegian research program for functional genomics, FUGE, last came together in the early 2000s. The Centre for Digital Life Norway together with several other groups, and with the support of the Research Council of Norway, wanted to do something about this.

Scientific conferences and meeting places are an important part of research. Here, researchers can present and receive feedback on their work from peers - an important part of ensuring research credibility. For students and younger researchers, it is also a valuable arena for finding future career opportunities and collaborations. There’s also an increasing interest in including other relevant groups in these meeting places, such as industry and business, public sector, and other interested parties.

Bioinformatics is a field of study that uses mathematics, statistics and informatics to understand biological data. The need for more advanced analyses comes from the large amounts of data that lie in genes, the genome, and the various building blocks and drivers of reactions — proteins — in organisms. Bioinformaticians works closely with biologists to study evolution, distinguish between different organisms and cellular reactions, and to explore and develop new medicines and treatments.

This fall, close to one hundred bioinformaticians from various universities and colleges, public sector, and companies met at Sundvolden Hotel outside Hønefoss. Over the course of three days, they listened to presentations from invited international researchers, shared their research with each other through presentations and posters, and participated in workshops. The workshops and posters in particular opened up for the exchange of experience and discussions about methods and challenges in research  – topics that are normally discussed internally in research groups.

The first evening, an informal sofa chat was arranged in front of the “fireplace” around the usefulness of big data and whole genome sequencing in the monitoring of animal and plant life. Inspired by the Norwegian talk show host Fredrik Skavlan, prof. Geir Kjetil Sandve from University of Oslo led a very nice discussion between Helle Baalsrud from NMBU and Frode Fossøy from Norwegian Institute of Nature Research on big data in academic basic research and applied research and surveillance in management.

For a number of students, this was the first conference they attended, and perhaps also the first time they presented their research to an audience. This is a good experience for further dissemination of their research. Prizes were also awarded for the best presentation and poster – congratulations to Lonneke Scheffer from  the University of Oslo and Hanna Sahlström from NMBU!

Unanimous feedback after the conference was that this should be repeated. It is therefore our great pleasure to announce that 'Norwegian Bioinformatics Days 2024' will be held in Bergen! The main organizer Computational Biology Unit (CBU) at the University of Bergen is open for people who would like to get involved in the planning. If you want to help shape the next meeting, get in touch at contact@norbioinfo.no.

The conference was arranged in in partnership with: