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Vancouver Bioinformatics User Group

VanBUG (Vancouver Bioinformatics Users Group) is an association of researchers, other professionals and students in the B.C. Lower Mainland who have an interest in the field of bioinformatics, computational biology, and data sciences. VanBUG meets every month from September through April. Research presentations by bioinformatics leaders, students and industry representatives are followed by networking over pizza and refreshments

Upcoming meetings will be held monthly on Thursdays from 11:00am to 1:30pm and are free and open to all. The majority of VanBUG events will now be held simultaneously at UBC's Michael Smith Laboratories and SFU's Big Data Hub. The speaker will be present in-person at one location while the other location receives live video-streaming and Q&A. Both locations will have a post lecture social with free food and drink. Please refer to the Schedule page or subscribe to our Calendar for specific details regarding speaker location and room information.

As a service to the community, local VanBUG and other bioinformatics events are posted to the Calendar. Click Subscribe to subscribe to this calendar, so that all current and future events appear on your personal calendar.

Visit our sister groups for bioinformatics events in Montreal (MonBUG) and Toronto (TorBUG)!

VanBUG Monthly Event

Event Details

Date/Time:

Thursday, February 29th, 2024 11:00am - 1:30pm PT

Location:

UBC, Michael Smith Laboratories, MSL 102

SFU Big Data Hub, room ASB 10900 (Live Stream Location)

Featured Speaker: Dr. Ana Conesa

Talk Title: Third-Generation Long-Read Transcriptome Sequencing for Unraveling Transcriptome Complexity

Affiliation:

  • Spanish National Research Council, Research Professor
  • University of Florida, Courtesy Professor
  • Biobam Bioinformatics, co-founder

Bio:

Ana Conesa is Research Professor at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and Courtesy Professor at the University of Florida. She is a member Spanish Royal Academy of Engineer, Fellow of the International Society for Computational Biology, honorary member of the Spanish Society of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology and member of the Board of Directors of the International Society for Computational Biology. She directs the CSIC network for Computational Biology and is co-founder of Biobam Bioinformatics, a start-up that provides bioinformatics tools for biologists. Ana Conesa’s lab is interested in understanding functional aspects of gene expression at the genome-wide level and across different organisms. Her group has developed statistical methods and software tools for transcriptomics analysis and she has pioneered the development of methods for multi-omics integration and long-reads transcriptomics. A strong drive in her research is helping the genomics community to bridge the gap between data and knowledge by creating bioinformatics tools that everybody can use. Some of our popular software tools are Blast2GO, PaintOmics, maSigPro, NOISeq, Qualimap, SQANTI, tappAS, etc that have received over 37,000 citations. She has led multiple EU projects to develop methods for the analysis of the transcriptome, more recently with a focus on the utilization of long read sequencing to characterize transcriptome complexity.

Abstract:

Third-generation long-read sequencing technologies offer the potential to sequence entire transcripts and unravel the intricacies of transcriptomes. However, the analysis of long-read transcriptomics (lrRNA-seq) data presents numerous challenges. These challenges encompass distinguishing biological variability from technical noise, accurately predicting transcript models, providing precise estimates of transcript expression levels and differential expression, and elucidating the biological significance of isoform diversity. In my presentation, I will showcase the research conducted in my laboratory that addresses these challenges. Moreover, I will discuss how, through the implementation of appropriate experimental techniques and bioinformatics approaches, lrRNA-seq has the capability to unveil fresh insights into the biology of the transcriptome.


Trainee Speaker: Dollina Dodani

Affiliation:

  • Bioinformatics Program, UBC, PhD Student
  • Talhouk Lab, Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, UBC, PhD Student

Talk Title: Assessing the reproducibility crisis of vaginal microbiome studies for clinical applications in endometrial cancer