Overview
Genomics is now a mainstay technology in most research and clinical laboratories that has led to unprecedented biological discoveries and revolutionized patient care in the clinic. Much of today's groundbreaking discoveries using genomic technologies is owing to the recent innovations in enabling platform technologies and methodologies. These platform technologies have had transformational effect on both basic biology research and clinical application of genomics, from enabling discovery of new cells types using single-cell RNA-sequencing, to novel blood-based diagnostics using sequencing of cell-free nucleic acids, to microfluidic platforms for organoid culture and drug screening. This is a rapidly growing field, and new developments are happening on a weekly basis. However, due to these platforms being technically sophisticated, unless the technology is already commercialized, they are still not very accessible to biologists and clinical scientists who wish to apply these technologies. Therefore, the two main goals of this focused program are (1) to invite leading experts in the field to discuss the most recent developments of new technologies and translational applications in genomics; (2) to promote education and information dissemination to the non-genomics academic community in order to facilitate cross-pollination of ideas and formation of interdisciplinary collaboration. Thus, this focused program invites a mixed group of attendees consisting technologists, biologists, and clinical researchers, while most of the invited speakers are leading technologists. Single cell genomics and molecular diagnostics technologies are the key themes to be explored in this focused program.
Organizers and program participants gather for a group photo.
