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. [Read More]

On March 14, 2023, we held a webinar (hosted by ISCBacademy) about “Re-Thinking the Patient’s Role in a Learning Health System: Lessons from the Patient-Led Research Collaborative” presented by Hannah Wei, co-founder and technologist at the Patient-Led Research Collaborative. See the webinar announcement for a full description. BOSC organizing committee member Monica Munoz-Torres introduced Ms. Wei and fielded a lively Q&A session. The webinar recording is available on YouTube at https://youtu. [Read More]

ISMB/BOSC is around the corner! We can hardly wait for the abstracts to start pouring in! We realize that some people can’t get conference travel approval from their institution until they get confirmation that their abstract has been accepted for a presentation. To help you, this year we have decided to offer Early Poster Acceptance: if you submit your abstract by March 31, we will let you know by April 6 whether it has been accepted or not for (at least) a poster. [Read More]

Date and Time: Tuesday, March 14, 11am EDT/ 15:00 (not 16:00!) UTC Location: Online webinar hosted by ISCB and free to the public. (Video now available at https://youtu.be/M2vAotWKd_Q) Speaker: Hannah Wei, co-founder and technologist at the Patient-Led Research Collaborative Topic: Re-Thinking the Patient’s Role in a Learning Health System: Lessons from the Patient-Led Research Collaborative The ISCB, which runs the annual ISMB conference, is offering a series of ISCBacademy webinars hosted by the Communities of Special Interest (COSIs), which include BOSC/OBF. [Read More]

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. [Read More]

We asked the community to nominate potential BOSC keynote speakers, and we were pleased with all the great suggestions! Now it’s time for the next phase of our process: we’re giving the community a chance to let us know if there is anything that makes any of the nominated individuals NOT appropriate as BOSC keynote speakers. Our invited speaker process and rubric gives examples of some possible reasons for exclusion. If you have concerns about any of the people on our list, please let us know (with as much specificity as you feel comfortable providing) via this anonymous form no later than February 16, 2023. [Read More]

BOSC usually includes two or three keynotes. We want these invited speakers to be prominent individuals or emerging leaders who are accomplished in their fields, and whose work is likely to be informative and of interest to the bioinformatics open source community. Please see our invited speaker rubric for more information about our keynote speaker selection process and criteria. We would like to assemble a diverse list of potential BOSC 2023 keynote speakers. [Read More]

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? [Read More]

Date, Time, and How to Join Date and time: 2022-10-21, 15:00 UTC (8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm UK) Agenda Board Officer Elections Chris Fields wishes to step down as Secretary, and Nomi Harris is standing for election to this role This will be an electronic ballot of the current board members Elections to the Board Iddo Friedberg, running for Board member at-large ( statement of interest) This will be an electronic ballot of the current board members Bylaw Changes We periodically review our bylaws Changes must formally approved by the Board at a public board meeting We plan minor changes to avoid gendered language, including subsuming the Secretary role (with historical gendered associations) into a Vice President role. [Read More]

The OBF Community Support Sponsorship scheme aims to sponsor small open-source-focused events like a scientific meeting, small conference, training workshop, hackathon, or time-limited series like monthly seminars. See details in this post. One application was funded under this program to prototype the workflow, with OBF offering financial support for a seminar series hosted by the Bioinformatics Hub Kenya. Congratulations to Michael Kofia Landi for leading this application and working collaboratively with the BHKi team – Pauline Karega, David Kiragu, Margaret Wanjiku and Festus Nyasimi – and OBF Board including Treasurer Heather Wiencko, to help establish a process for this new type of OBF funding. [Read More]