Bioinformatics June 2023
Where Maths Meets the Microbiome
On June 7-9th the “Next-Generation Bioinformatics Tools for Microbiome Research” conference was held in the beautiful Aula Maximum, University College Cork (UCC), with around 100 international attendees. The event was jointly hosted by APC Microbiome Ireland (APC) and the EU COST Action ML4Microbiome, and was co-sponsored by APC spinout company SeqBiome and the UCC School of Microbiology.
APC’s reputation and work in bioinformatics has been long recognised of the highest international standard, and is predicated on the continuous development of state-of-the-art computational models, databases and methodologies to remain at the forefront of microbiome science. The conference’s primary aim was to showcase APC’s ongoing work in method development, and facilitate cross-sharing of experience and advice in the optimal usage of existing tools.
The event contained a series of lively talks and presentations including a panel discussion where barriers to methods development were debated. The conference was chaired by Prof Marcus Claesson from UCC and Prof Ines Thiele and Tim Hensen from National University of Galway (NUIG)UIG, and had speakers from Finland, Greece, Hungary, The Netherlands, in addition to APC-associated contributors from Cork, Galway and Dublin.
This was also the last meeting of the COST Action ML4Microbiome, which has 170 members across 35 countries. Machine Learning (ML) holds tremendous potential for finding new patterns in large datasets, but the complexities of microbiome data present plenty of challenges. The aim of ML4Microbiome is therefore to optimise, standardise and disseminate best practice of ML for analysing human microbiome data.
In addition to progressing this highly cross-disciplinary field and network (papers submitted), ML4Microbiome organised for a large number of young researchers to be trained in ML and bioinformatics while many others have received funding for guest research projects across European labs.
The event was also the first opportunity for many of the 40 COST members (out of the 100 attendees) to visit Ireland and their evenings were crowned with Franciscan Well pizza, historic walking tours, traditional music and of course, stout.
Conference organiser and Chair of ML4Microbiome Prof Marcus Claesson said “It was fantastic to finally bring this diverse microbiome-bioinformatics-ML community together, and to see them sharing their experiences and expertise and striking up collaborations. ML4Microbiome members have been working closely together for nearly 5 years, often meeting in various European big cities. It felt very fitting to finally finish on a high note in Cork.“
See full agenda at https://www.ml4microbiome.eu/activities-and-events/joint-ml4microbiome-conference-apc-microbiome-ireland-meeting/.
