The Modern Synthesis

The Modern Synthesis

Population genetics

SystematicsPaleontology

Botany and Zoology

ModernPost-modern

• Address grand challenge questions in evolutionary biology

• Focus on areas ripe for conceptual synthesis

• Allow the wealth of existing data to be fully utilized

• Facilitate collaboration among disciplines and institutions

• Support scholars pursuing synthetic research

Sponsored science at NESCent

• Visiting postdoctoral and sabbatical scholars

• Catalysis meetings (~30 participants; highly interdisciplinary, to spawn collaborations)

• Working groups (~15 participants, more focused topic, multiple meetings, specific outcomes)

Education & Outreach

• Staff– Kristin Jenkins – Jory Weintraub

• Disseminate NESCent science• Promote evolution education at institutions

serving under-represented groups• Organize annual symposium for National

Association of Biology Teachers (with AIBS)• Support NESCent postdoc professional

development• Consult on broader impacts

Business & Logistics

• Staff– Karen Henry, Assistant Director for Administration

– Jeff Sturkey, Logistics Manager– Barbara Mitchell, Business Manager– Marcia Painter, Administrative Assistant

Informatics @ NESCentMission

– Support for sponsored science– “Cyberinfrastructure” to enable evolutionary synthesis• Data sharing/exchange and database technology• Software development• Training, dissemination and user support

Resources– IT and bioinformatics staff (currently hiring!)– Hardware for HPC, software development, web/db services

– Logistical and technical support for collaborative development projects

Thinking about a proposal?Here’s what to expect

• We can – Provide infrastructure for collaborative projects

– Prototype databases, software, etc. meant for public dissemination

– Partner with you on external grants to go beyond the prototype stage

• We can’t– Provide long-term maintenance for public resources (except through SDSC Data Central)

– Adopt all possible technologies – Substitute for data experts or database curators

Major initiatives

• Where do they come from?– Working groups and center visitors– Whitepapers - come to us with your dreams!– Advisory groups

• Leverage a vast array of existing resources– Open source software initiatives– Expertise and energy within the evolution community (and beyond)

• This is your center - use us!

Evolutionary model organisms

Evolutionary model system databases

Interface of genomics and evolutionary biology– Genome models are venturing into phylogenetics and population genetics

– Evolutionary biologists are acquiring genomic information for their own model systems

How many times must we invent the same genome database?– Expensive– Distracting– Not easy to do, but easy to do poorly

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (LZW) decompressor

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QuickTime™ and aTIFF (LZW) decompressor

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Tailoring GMOD to evolutionary model

systems

• Extension of schema and visualization tools for genetic and phenotypic variation, geographic information and phylogenetics

• Providing user support

Brokering between natural phenotypic diversity and model organism genetics

Working group led by Paula Mabee (U. South Dakota) & Monte Westerfield (U. of Oregon)

Phenotypic reasoning

• What zebrafish mutants differ from the wild type the same way that this apomorphy distinguishes this clade?

• Are characters that are phylogenetically correlated also genetically correlated in zebrafish mutants?

What is an ontology?

• A way for a community to agree upon the meanings of terms and relations in order to reliably share knowledge about a specific domain

• Automated processes that share this knowledge representation can perform simple reasoning

Elements of an ontology

• Types: Collections of objects that share common attributes

• Attributes: properties that objects can have and share

• Instances: Specific objects that manifest a type

• Relations: ways that objects can be related to one another

Gene Ontology

from yeastgenome.org

Representing phenotypes

• Entity-Qua[l|nt]ity (EQ) syntax – Entities come from an organism-specific anatomy ontology (AO)•Several are being developed for genomic model organisms

– Qualities come from the Phenotype Attributes and Trait Ontology (PATO)

Use of PATO

from arabidopsis.info

Use your center

• Upcoming calls for proposals– Postdoc/sabbaticals - December– Working groups/catalysis meetings - Dec & June

• Submit a whitepaper (whenever)• Consider us for collaborative projects• Contact us:

– Todd Vision (Assoc. Director): tjv@bio.unc.edu

– Hilmar Lapp (Asst. Director): hlapp@duke.edu

Globally Unique Identifiers (GUIDs)

• With – Taxonomic Data Working Group (TDWG) – Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF)

• The aim: to have a persistent, unique, resolvable identifier for a biological resource that can be distinguished from its location on the web– Museum specimens– Taxonomic concepts– Publication (e.g. DOI)

• Adopting Life Science Identifiers (LSIDs)

Software initiatives

• Sponsoring working groups and hackathons in phyloinformatics and population genetics

• Training– Summer course in evolutionary informatics

Outline

• The importance of informatics to evolutionary synthesis

• What kinds of informatics support NESCent set up to do (and not to do)

• Leveraging open source software initiatives and training the future community of evolutionary informaticists

• The role of databases and our efforts to tailor GMOD to evolutionary model organisms

• Some semantic web technologies (e.g. ontologies) that every evolutionary biologist should care about

• The cypriniformes phenotype comparison engine as an example that ties these themes together

DRIADE Stakeholders Wkshp

5 Dec 2006

Published data today

Where we’d like to be tomorrow

Digital Repository for Information and Data in

Evolution (DRIADE)

Proposed role for DRIADE

Journals

Specialized data repositories

(eg Genbank, Morphbank, PaleoDB Treebase)

Societies

Researchers

PublishersEditors

ReviewersDigital DataRepository

Data registries and repositories

Role of metadata

• Two central questions– What metadata to keep?– How to get the metadata that’s needed?

• Partnership with the <MRC>– Director: Jane Greenberg

Many other decisions to be made

• Technical– What software solutions to adopt?– Centralized or distributed physical storage?– How to interface with journals and specialized databases?

• Social– Is deposition mandatory?– Are there additional incentives?

• Intellectual Property– Are there any limits on data use?

• Business– How to ensure long-term financial stewardship?– How much to invest in metadata curation?

Other disciplinary data repositories and data integration projects

• caBio (Cancer Biology)• Conservation Commons (Conservation Biology)

• GEON (Geology)• ICPSR (Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research)

• Marine Metadata Initiative• Virtual Observatory (Astronomy)• World Data Center System (Geography)

A reality-based approach

DRIADE: Near-term plans

• Requirements gathering and evaluation phase– Technical consultations

• Workshop for information science experts in March 2007

• To learn from the experiences of other disciplines

– Stakeholder consultations• Major design meeting in May 2007

• Implementation– Phase I: Stopgap solution?– Phase 2: for which external funding will be required

– Feasible milestones?

Schedule9:00-10:00 - BackgroundHilmar Lapp - Objectives and requirements gatheringJane Greenberg & Co. - Issues regarding metadata Ahrash Bissell - OpenContext

10:00 - Brainstorming sessionWhat use cases do we imagine?What are the requirements and

priorities?How to continue gathering requirements?What experts and stakeholders to

include?12:00 Lunch