7th NGBT conference held in Bhubaneswar

The conference featured developments in genomics technologies and their applications in life sciences

SciGenom Research Foundation (SGRF) recently organised its seventh annual international conference titled ‘NextGen Genomics, Biology, Bioinformatics and Technologies (NGBT)’ in Bhubaneswar. The co-hosts for this edition of the NGBT meeting included The Centre for the Commercialization of Antibodies and Biologics (CCAB); The Toronto Recombinant Antibody Centre (TRAC), Toronto, Canada; Institute of Bioinformatics (IOB), Bengaluru, National Institute of Science, Education and Research, Odisha, and Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology University (KIIT), Odisha.

The conference featured developments in genomics technologies and their applications in life sciences including human, plant and animal biology, drug discovery, cancer immunology, genome engineering using CRISPR/CAS9, medical applications and personalised therapy. Featuring accomplished national and international speakers, thinkers and thought leaders that shape the course of scientific discovery, the conference saw about 80 talks and 13 keynote lectures delivered. Speakers and delegates representing leading universities and research institutions from India and abroad were at the meeting.

Genome Asia 100K served as Knowledge Partner for the Conference. The Canadian Journal of Biotechnology indexed the student abstract and sponsored the poster awards along with Genome Asia 100k. The Conference also featured industry leaders from Illumina, MedGenome, Premas, Agrigenome, FeatherSoft, PacBio, ILS, Integrated DNA Technologies (IDT), Nanostring, Agena, New England BioLabs, MagGenome, KSIDC, Agilent and other leading organizations.

At the meeting, SGRF presented the 2017 Lifetime Achievement Award to Dr Partha Majumder, NIBMG, Kalyani, India. Dr K Thangaraj, CCMB Hyderabad was awarded the 2017 SGRF Excellence in Science Award. SGRF awarded scholarships and travel awards to 140 students to enable their participation at the meeting. SGRF also announced the winners of its 2017 Genomics Project Grants at the meeting.