The Centre for BioMedical Informatics (CBMI) held its fourth Annual Symposium at the University of Kent with the theme, 'Making Sense of Biological Data'. Dr. Colin Johnson, Director of the CBMI and Senior Lecturer in the Computing Laboratory, opened the proceedings.
A problem facing researchers is how to make sense of the large amount of biological and medical data being produced by an ever increasing number of scientific studies. The symposium consisted of a series of excellent talks given by eminent scientists working in the field of biomedical informatics. They talked about their experiences using various computational methods within their own specialisms. Central to the symposium was the subject of medical genetics and human health. Professor Chris Holmes, from the Oxford Centre for Gene Function, described how he used statistical methods and clustering algorithms in analysing data which shows that many diseases have a genetic component, for example, diabetes.
Dr. Colin Johnson is involved in a wide variety of research activities at the interface between computing and the biomedical sciences. These involve both the application of computational methods to study problems such as cancer formation and protein-protein interaction, and taking ideas from biology to create novel computer systems based, for example, on ant colony behaviour and evolution. Colin said:
" I am pleased that we have been able to get researchers from around the country to meet at Kent for an afternoon of talks and discussion in this exciting and important area of science. "
A poster competition for research students and post-doctoral research staff was judged by members of the CBMI committee, and prizes donated by the Dean of Science and the Vice-Chancellor's office were presented by the Pro-Vice Chancellor, Prof. John Baldock. The first prize was awarded to Mohammed Nasiri-Avanaki from the School of Physical Sciences for his work on Skin Cancer Detection using Optical Coherence Tomography, and runner-up prizes were awarded to Martin Volker and Michael Hughes.
The programme for the symposium follows:
The event took place in the Grimond Lecture Theatre, University of Kent, Canterbury campus on Thursday 28th May 2009.
Published 28 May 2009
Contact: M.L.Bowman@kent.ac.uk