ViralBioinfAsia2022

Viral Genomics and Bioinformatics Asia 2022

Base for the Viral Genomics and Bioinformatics Repository

Course overview

We are pleased to announce the next Viral Genomics and Bioinformatics in collaboration with COVID-19 Genomics (COG) Train (COG-Train).

Viruses are a huge public health burden all around the world. In Asia, viral infections such as influenza, dengue fever, hand, foot and mouth disease, chikungunya, and viral hepatitis kill hundreds of thousands of people each year. Apart from health issues, emerging viral illnesses and epidemics have a global economic impact. According to the World Bank, the SARS-Cov-2 pandemic caused a more than $10 trillion deficit in the global economy in 2020-2021 alone. This demonstrates the impact of viral illnesses not only on human and animal health, but also on social and economic growth of the world.

Technological advances in science and research are making it possible to rapid detection, surveillance and management of viral diseases. In recent years, next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies have played an important role in the identification and classification of viruses, in the detection of drug resistance mutations and in the treatment and surveillance of viral diseases. Early identification of a virus and quick analysis of its genome will aid towards better treatment and help in controlling the disease spread. Along with the advances in the sequencing technologies, it is necessary to develop data management methods, computational analysis tools and human expertise to cope with the sequence deluge. The number of researchers able to interpret viral high throughput sequence data is currently limited.

The Viral Genomics and Bioinformatics course will teach participants how to analyse viral genome sequences and interpret genomic data obtained by high-throughput sequencing. The use of the command line to analyse viral NGS data, quality control of sequences, reference mapping and de novo assembly of viral genomes, pathogen identification from metagenomics data, and creating phylogenetic trees will be covered in the course.

Course website