Abstract
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Speakers in the systems biology track discussed new discoveries, computational methods, and technologies for studying biology at a genome-wide scale. Talks focused on topics such as methods for analyzing genome-wide regulatory network models, single-cell technologies for studying cellular heterogeneity, computational approaches for integrating multiple biological data types, ways of capturing dynamic biological activity across time, and tools for predicting drug sensitivity and mechanism of action. The systems biology track also paid particular attention to applications of systems biology to the study of cancer biology, and several talks presented findings with potential impact in translational research. Speakers in the regulatory genomics track looked at how regulation takes place at various stages of genomic activity, including the genomic, transcriptional, post-transcriptional, post-translational, and structural levels. Researchers presented new technological advances for studying genome regulation at higher resolution, discussed the opportunities and challenges of modeling genome regulation, and described ways in which the study of genome regulation has opened up new avenues for the study of genetics.
The DREAM challenges offered an opportunity to assess the relative effectiveness of various systems biology methods, and in a spirit of competitive collaboration leveraged the “wisdom of crowds” to generate valuable insights that have implications for addressing several ongoing challenges in biomedical research. Best performers were announced for four recent DREAM challenges, including the DREAM Rheumatoid Arthritis Responder Challenge, the ICGC-TCGA DREAM Somatic Mutation Calling Challenge, the Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) Outcome Prediction Challenge, and the Broad-DREAM Gene Essentiality Prediction (GEP) Challenge.
For the first time, this year's conference also featured a workshop focusing on Cytoscape, an open source suite of tools for visualizing biological networks. Organized by Barry Demchak, Alexander Pico, and Trey Ideker, the workshop offered hands-on tutorials for Cytoscape users and developers as well as presentations of several new Cytoscape apps for network-based analysis and visualization of large biological data sets.
The papers in the collection that follows were submitted to the conference and judged by the program committee to constitute valuable contributions to the field of computational biology. Describing a variety of new and emerging methods for predicting genetic and molecular regulatory networks, the papers demonstrate the ways in which the integrative perspectives of computational biology can generate exciting opportunities for the study of biological systems.