Travel-Fellowship

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship program aims to promote diverse participation at events promoting open-source bioinformatics software development and open science practices in the biological research community. Daniela Senra, a PhD researcher at Centro Regional de Estudios Genómicos, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, was awarded an OBF Event Fellowship to attend the Human Cell Atlas General Meeting 2023.

In July, I had the incredible opportunity to attend and present a lightning talk at the Human Cell Atlas General Meeting 2023, that took place in the city of Toronto, Canada, from July 10th to July 12th, 2023.

The call for applications for the OBF Event Fellowship 2023, round 2, is now open. The deadline for this round is 1 August 2023. Applications should be submitted via this Google Form. We have provided a Word template to help you draft the application locally before filling out the form – make a copy of this template.

The OBF Event Fellowship program aims to increase diverse participation at events that promote open-source bioinformatics and/or open science. We invite applications from candidates seeking financial support to attend relevant scientific events from September 2023 to April 2024. These events include conferences, workshops, code fests, hackathons, training courses, collaborative sprints, informal meet-ups or other skill-building and networking events. For more details, please read our OBF Event Fellowship policy document.

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship program aims to promote diverse participation at events promoting open-source bioinformatics software development and open science practices in the biological research community. Ruth Nanjala, a DPhil student in Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the University of Oxford, was awarded an OBF Event Fellowship to attend the International Congress of Human Genetics (ICHG) 2023 conference.

Earlier in 2022, I received the Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship for participating and promoting open science at the American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) 2022 conference in Los Angeles. However, I could not travel to ASHG due to unavoidable circumstances. Fortunately, OBF gave me a second chance by facilitating my travel to the International Congress of Human Genetics (ICHG) 2023 conference hosted at home (Africa is considered the cradle of humankind) between the 22nd and 26th of February.

The call for applications for the OBF Event Fellowship 2023, round 1, is now open. The deadline for this round is 1 April 2023. Applications should be submitted via this Google Form. We have provided a Word template to help you draft the application locally before filling the form – make a copy of this template.The OBF Event Fellowship program aims to increase diverse participation at events that promote open source bioinformatics and/or open science. We invite applications from candidates who are seeking financial support to attend or host relevant scientific events from May 2023 to April 2024. These events can be conferences, workshops, code fests, hackathons, training courses, collaborative sprints, informal meet-ups or other skill-building and networking events. For more details, please read our OBF Event Fellowship policy document.

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship program aims to promote diverse participation at events promoting open source bioinformatics software development and open science practices in the biological research community. Luise Rauer, a PhD student at the Technical University of Munich, was awarded an OBF Event Fellowship to participate virtually in the 9th International Human Microbiome Consortium (IHMC) conference in November 2022.

What do a total lunar eclipse and the 9th International Human Microbiome Consortium (IHMC) conference have in common? While they are both exciting and rare events that started in Kobe, Japan, on 8th November 2022, they also happened in the very early morning for any spectator from Europe. With the IHMC conference starting at 1 a.m. for me as a virtual participant based in Central Europe, my very unique preparation for this conference included changing my sleeping rhythm to become a nighthawk for 3 days and nights. But it was worth it!

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship program aims to promote diverse participation at events promoting open-source bioinformatics software development and open science practices in the biological research community. Dr. Laura Ación , a researcher at the Instituto de Cálculo, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina . She is also one of the co-founders of MetaDocencia , which she could partly support with the OBF Event fellowship granted to her in the December 2019 application round.

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship program aims to promote diverse participation at events promoting open source bioinformatics software development and open science practices in the biological research community. Pengfei Fan, a researcher from Queen Mary University of London, was supported to participate in CLEO 2020 by this fellowship granted to him in the application round-1 of 2020. Find more information here.

During the last two decades, we are witnessing a fascinating growth of computational imaging (CI) methods, e.g. tomography, compressive sensing and 3D/super-resolved/lensless microscopy, and artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms, mainly machine learning and deep learning, both from the theoretical (mathematical) and practical (experimental) point of view. New computational capabilities in terms of, e.g., big data, large scale optimisation, neural networks and highly parallel computing, are facilitating further improvements in numerically enhanced imaging surpassing the limitations imposed by ‘classical’ all-optical information processing systems. It is joyful to observe how CI and AI merge to innovatively address challenging tasks fuelled by wide-spreading applications in 3D imaging, biomedicine, microscopy and general physics of light propagation in scattering media, to name just a few. When designing a computational imaging technique, one needs to originally link the applicable data acquisition scheme with the capable image reconstruction algorithm, often aided by learning-based frameworks employed not only for image classification and interpretation but also for image formation and final outcome restoration. As the AI stimulatory development continues to flourish, open-source tools and software, especially deep learning framework and platform, have become a key ingredient of modern science. Hundreds of software packages, libraries, and applications have become essential tools.

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) Event Fellowship program aims to promote diverse participation at events promoting open source bioinformatics software development and open science practices in the biological research community. Edidiong Etuk (Eddie), an open-source lover and a software engineer from Nigeria, was supported to take part in Bioinformatics Open Source Conference 2020 by this fellowship granted to him in the application round-1 of 2020. Find more information here.

TL;DR This post is about my experience at Bioinformatics Community Conference 2020.

on behalf of the OBF Board members

We are delighted to announce that four awardees have been selected to receive the OBF travel fellowship for 2020 round 1, to support their participation in virtual events.

The OBF travel fellowship is now offered 2 times a year to multiple awardees towards supporting their participation in scientific workshops, conference and training events. The selection of individuals is made based on their applications, which state how their participation in the chosen event helps them promote open science practices in bioinformatics and/or enhance representation of minority groups in their communities.

The Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) sponsors a Travel Fellowship program aimed at increasing diverse participation at events promoting Open Source bioinformatics software development and open science in the biological research community. Michael Thompson’s participation at the Galaxy Admin Training 2020 workshop in Barcelona was supported by this fellowship. Find more information here.

I had the opportunity to visit the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (B.S.C) in Spain from 2nd - 6th March 2020 to participate in the Galaxy Admin Training 2020, organized by Galaxy Europe and in partnership with B.S.C, Elixir, and de.NBI.