Bioinformatics For the Future Report

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Bioinformatics For the Future Report

	Bioinformatics—the union of biology, computer science, and information technology—is generating research opportunities and challenges. This mix of opportunities and challenges was a constant theme throughout a series of workshops and seminars organised by EMBL Australia in conjunction with the March 2009 visit of Dr Ewan Birney, Senior Scientist of the European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI) of the EMBL. These events were attended by 130 leading researchers from biological sciences, medicine, computation and mathematics, state and national science administrators, and international experts. EMBL Australia has launched a report that summarises Dr Birney’s visit and outlines key issues identified in the workshops and seminars. To download a copy of the Bioinformatics for the Future 2009 report, click here or to download Bioinformatics for the Future - an update 2011 report, click here. The common theme arising from all the discussions is the incredible demand for more capacity in bioinformatics, and that timely investment in bioinformatics infrastructure—mainly at the level of skilled personnel—would provide a competitive advantage to Australian science, unlock many new discoveries, and increase Australia’s presence in the international science landscape. Strategic investment in skilled personnel in bioinformatics infrastructure would catalyse the potential synergies between the very effective eResearch computational infrastructure (now in transition towards the SuperScience agenda), including national high-performance computing, and these new, far cheaper, next-generation molecular biology technologies. The coordination of high-performance computing in Australia, with a balance between computation and disk provision, is impressive and world-class. Similarly the inventiveness of Australian bioscience has grown and now provides world-leading innovation in a number of areas. However, the lack of skilled bioinformatics individuals remains the critical missing component in bringing these two world class programs together. Relative to Australia’s infrastructure spending, a small investment to implement this critical bioinformatics capacity stands to yield a disproportionately large return. It is likely that over five to ten years, this bioinformatics capacity will simply become part of modern molecular biology; at this point in time, however, there is a critical capacity gap and also considerable worldwide competition for skilled individuals. Strategic investment is the only way to enable this science.

Bioinformatics—the union of biology, computer science, and information technology—is generating research opportunities and challenges. This mix of opportunities and challenges was a constant theme throughout a series of workshops and seminars organised by EMBL Australia in conjunction with the March 2009 visit of Dr Ewan Birney, Senior Scientist of the European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI) of the EMBL. These events were attended by 130 leading researchers from biological sciences, medicine, computation and mathematics, state and national science administrators, and international experts.

EMBL Australia has launched a report that summarises Dr Birney’s visit and outlines key issues identified in the workshops and seminars. To download a copy of the Bioinformatics for the Future 2009 report, click here or to download Bioinformatics for the Future - an update 2011 report, click here.

The common theme arising from all the discussions is the incredible demand for more capacity in bioinformatics, and that timely investment in bioinformatics infrastructure—mainly at the level of skilled personnel—would provide a competitive advantage to Australian science, unlock many new discoveries, and increase Australia’s presence in the international science landscape.

Strategic investment in skilled personnel in bioinformatics infrastructure would catalyse the potential synergies between the very effective eResearch computational infrastructure (now in transition towards the SuperScience agenda), including national high-performance computing, and these new, far cheaper, next-generation molecular biology technologies. The coordination of high-performance computing in Australia, with a balance between computation and disk provision, is impressive and world-class. Similarly the inventiveness of Australian bioscience has grown and now provides world-leading innovation in a number of areas. However, the lack of skilled bioinformatics individuals remains the critical missing component in bringing these two world class programs together.

Relative to Australia’s infrastructure spending, a small investment to implement this critical bioinformatics capacity stands to yield a disproportionately large return. It is likely that over five to ten years, this bioinformatics capacity will simply become part of modern molecular biology; at this point in time, however, there is a critical capacity gap and also considerable worldwide competition for skilled individuals. Strategic investment is the only way to enable this science.