OBF Travel Fellowship 2020: Round 1 and BCC 2020

We are currently accepting applications for the first application round for the OBF Travel Fellowship 2020. This fellowship aims to promote the conference/event participation of attendees who advocate and present their work related to open-source bioinformatics software development and open science in the biological research community. In 2019, a total of 9 applicants received OBF travel fellowships to attend various conferences across the globe to present their work, gain new skills and promote Open Science practices in their respective areas of life science. [Read More]

Call for OBF Travel Fellowship is Open until 1 December 2019 

The call for OBF travel fellowship to select the next round of awardees is officially open! Please submit your application by filling out this form. Deadline for this round is 1 December 2019. This fellowship aims to support our community members in attending events that promote open source software development and/or open science in the biological research fields. As the organiser of Bioinformatics Open Source Conference (BOSC) since 2000, OBF understands the role of such conferences and wants to support people who can benefit from showcasing their work, learn from each other and promote open science at BOSC or similar events. [Read More]

Computational biology without borders

This is a guest blog post from Aziz Khan, who was supported by the ongoing Open Bioinformatics Foundation travel fellowship program to attend the ISMB/ECCB and BOSC 2019 meeting in Basel, July 2019. The OBF’s Travel Fellowship program aimed at increasing diverse participation at events promoting open source bioinformatics software development and open science in the biological research community. Find more information here. Computational tools and software are now becoming the core of scientific discovery, and making it open source and sharing it freely with the community helps to take scientific discoveries to the next level. [Read More]

5 tips to promote 'water cooler effects' at informal discussion sessions

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. Malvika’s participation at Bioinformatics Open Source Conference 2019 was supported by this fellowship granted to her in January 2019. Find more information here. The phrase ‘water cooler effect’ is derived from informal gatherings and connections made around water coolers (or vending machines these days! [Read More]

Cordon Bleu Bioinformatics

I attended the Bioinformatics Open Source Conference ( BOSC 2019) organized this year along with ISMB/ECCB in Basel, Switzerland from July 21st-25th. BOSC 2019 was in multiple ways a lot of ‘firsts’ for me. I was attending my first ISMB/ECCB. It also happened to be my first time in Europe. It was the first time I was putting faces and voices to a lot of names. Like in most of the conferences these days, I met a lot of Twitter-verse friends for the very first time. [Read More]

Meeting report: BOSC 2019, the 20th Annual BOSC

As Europe experienced a record-breaking heat wave, BOSC 2019 attendees stayed cool in the Basel Congress Center (and many took breaks by floating down the Rhine). This was the 20th annual BOSC. In 2018, BOSC partnered with the Galaxy Community Conference in GCCBOSC2018; this year, it returned to ISMB as one of over a dozen “Communities of Special Interest” (COSIs). BOSC 2019 opened on July 24 with chair Nomi Harris noting that over its 20 years, BOSC has been held in 12 different countries, 6 US states and 2 Canadian provinces. [Read More]

BOSC late-round abstract submission closes May 15!

If you’d like the opportunity to present your work at BOSC 2019 (which will take place in Basel, Switzerland, on July 24-25, the last two days of ISMB/ECCB 2019), now’s your chance! The late round of abstract submission is open, and we will be choosing a few abstracts for “Late-Breaking Lightning Talks” as well as posters. BOSC welcomes submissions about all aspects of open source bioinformatics, open science and open data. [Read More]

New OBF logo

We have successfully crowd-sourced a new OBF logo! The process started at the OBF Birds of a Feather meeting at GCCBOSC 2018 when the OBF leaders announced that we were seeking a new logo design. Two BoF participants immediately started sketching ideas, as well as a third community member who was not at the BoF but saw our tweet. The designs (which you can see here) were put up for a public vote. [Read More]

The color of bioinformatics: what is it and how can it be modified?

This is a guest blog post from Tendai Mutangadura, who was supported by the ongoing Open Bioinformatics Foundation travel fellowship program to attend the GCCBOSC 2018 meeting in Portland, June 2018. The OBF’s Travel Fellowship program continues to help open source bioinformatics software developers with funding to attend conferences or workshops. This was one of three awards from our April 2018 travel fellowships call. Our August call recently closed, the current call closes 15 December 2018, you might want to apply? [Read More]

City of roses they call it - Portland Oregon (USA)

How should I start describing the fruitful experience in this amazing city… First time ever in Portland, second time attending BOSC… I knew I was signing up for a great time but did not know much about the uncanny beauty of this picturesque city.

First of all, I would like to thank the Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF) for providing partial funding to support my travel expenses (though an OBF Travel Fellowship award). I would also like to thank my PhD supervisors Andrew Lonie and Richard O. Sinnott for the remaining expenditure.

[Read More]