Research projects will assist researchers in analyzing and interpreting massive data sets

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Joint Genome Canada-CIHR competition

Researchers required to handle increasingly massive volumes digital information will gain powerful new tools following the completion of 16 new research projects designed to help analyze, interpret and apply biological data. Genome Canada and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) have announced $4 million over two years to support the 2015 Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (B/CB) competition at academic institutions across the country.

The competition attracted 115 applications for funding, which does not require matching dollars The projects involve software and methods for looking at data and are highly targetted.

Ontario was strongly represented in the results, accounting for eight of the 16 projects — most of which are worth $250,000 each. Dr Robin Harkness, VP research at Ontario Genomics, says the province’s research strength in B/CB is reflected in its robust showing.

“This funding will help with data interpretation and the use of data we have, transforming complex data into useable form,” says Harkness. “Projects are focused on next-generation tools and technologies and providing data access to the research community.”

Two of Ontario Genomics’ projects are co-led with sister genome centres in Atlantic Canada and BC.

BC also performed well in the competition with five awards and another shared with Ontario Genomics.

“Genomics is the driver of biotech, the adoption of precision medicine and biomedicine,” says Harkness. “There’s been a dramatic increase in the amount of data available, especially sequencing. The challenge is to analyze and interpret it.”

CIHR funding was provided through its Roadmap Accelerator Fund and the Institute for Musculoskeletal Health and Arthritis.

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B/CB Competition results
Genome British Columbia
* New bioinformatics for new sequencing technologies: Genome characterization and variation detection using long reads
* Automated analysis of big flow cytometry data
* PathOGIST: Calibrated multi-criterion gen-omic analysis for public health microbiology
* On Target: Big Data-Informed Software for the Design of cis-Regulatory Regions Controlling Human Gene Expression
* Genomic Epidemiology Application Ontology
Ontario Genomics
* Enhanced and Automated Visualization of Complex Data
* Consolidated epigenetic landscape for congenital, developmental & childhood disorders
* Dockstore: A platform for sharing cloud-agnostic tools with the research community
* Kamphir: a versatile framework to fit models to phylogenetic tree shapes
* ePlants Pipeline and Navigator for Accessing and Integrating Multi-Level ‘Omics Data for Hypothesis Generation
* Rapid, accessible genome assembly using long read sequencing
Quebec
*Computation of cell-specific microRNA:mRNA regulatory networks enables the design of efficient RNAi-based therapeutics
* A toolkit for genome-wide association studies in bacteria
* Computational methods and databases to identify small RNA-binding molecules regulating gene expression
* Crowdsourcing Genomic Databases
Genome Atlantic
* Rapid prediction of antimicrobial resistance from metagenomic samples: data, models, and methods

 

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