This workshop is aimed at bringing together ~40 diverse speciation researchers:

- to collaborate on populating a database of published reproductive barriers based on a standardized RIO framework (https://ecoevorxiv.org/repository/view/10083/). This will involve working through papers during the workshop to extract RI measures and other metadata and entering them into a draft database (some preparatory work before the workshop may be requested to facilitate these steps during the workshop)

- to start working towards a manuscript using this database to answer an outstanding question in speciation

- to network, learn about reproductive isolation, and have fun!

If you are interested in applying to participate in the workshop, please fill out the form in the link below by ** May 20th **. Room & board will be covered by the organizers; all other travel costs are the responsibility of the attendee.

Application link:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSenAMqSdZjeRmKEDtBNa5tpjPn7IukPyT5BzfZ4JMpIk2YOEw/viewform

The previous IOS workshop was held in Finland in 2023 (see more details at https://speciation-network.pages.ist.ac.at/workshops) and resulted in new interactions between speciation researchers and the successful publication of an Integration of Speciation research manuscript (https://academic.oup.com/evolinnean/article/3/1/kzae001/7609448).

We look forward to seeing you in Glasgow!

Campaign calendar:

- Opening date for applications: January 30, 2020
- Deadline for applications: March 5, 2020
- Pre-selections: April-May 2020
- Final selections: May-June 2020
- Starting date for appointments: from September 2020

More at https://jobs.inrae.fr/en/open-competitions/open-competions-research-scientists-crcn

The following 5 questions are those that I have heard many times during the job-search process. There is no reason for not planning responses in such situations.

1. Tell Us About Yourself
This is a very typical opener in interviews. It's a perfect question to ask, and getting something planned will really help you concentrate and ease in the conversation. However, you need to make sure that your response is applicable to the job you're interviewing.
It's probably better to keep your answer professional. Try to include these in the answer as well: where did your love of science and bioinformatics come from? How the heck did you end up in this field? Why programming and scripting ?

2. What is your plan for your bioinformatics career? / How do you look at yourself in five years? / How are your personal objectives to accomplish these goals / What are the plan for your research fundings ?

Your CV/resume has already impressed the selection panel if you have been invited for an interview. The questions from the bioinformatics interview team provide an incentive for you to market yourself and illustrate the work in question with the most appropriate knowledge.

3. What do you understand about the job description/What would your suggested research path be if you were a successful candidate?
Summarize the specifics of the advertised bioinformatics position in your own words. Follow on with some suggestions of how you want to extend your research and create your own projects within the community.

4. Will you work as a group or do you want to work on your own?
This requirement can vary from jobs to job, so when addressing, be alert. A company/research PI may need a bioinformatician that is able to work on a single project autonomously, or they may need a person who can help direct and organize a team. In your response, refer to the job description.

5. What particular methods have you used to date with your experiments?
You might have experience with all the laboratory techniques described in the job description, but stress the ones you highly experienced with. Highlight your professional abilities and stress that you are extremely capable of mastering new techniques with others ...

At the end of the day, remember that you're questioning the jury as well as they're interviewing you. You will ought to think of any questions you would like the interview panel to pose. This indicates that you have done your homework and serious about the position.

All the best for your future job interview.

1. NCBI (National Center for Biotechnology Information):

   • NCBI provides various databases related to genetic information, including 16S rRNA sequences.
   • You can access the 16S ribosomal RNA sequences from NCBI's Nucleotide database (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nucleotide/).
   • Perform a search using keywords like "16S rRNA" or specific bacterial names to find relevant sequences.
   • You can download sequences individually or in batches using the provided tools.

2. GreenGenes:

   • GreenGenes is a widely used 16S rRNA gene sequence database.
   • You can access it at http://greengenes.secondgenome.com/.
   • GreenGenes provides precompiled databases for various purposes, including classification, alignment, and phylogenetic analysis.

3. SILVA:

   • SILVA (https://www.arb-silva.de/) is another comprehensive database for ribosomal RNA (rRNA) sequences.
   • It covers not only 16S rRNA but also other ribosomal RNA sequences.
   • SILVA provides precompiled databases for various purposes, including taxonomic classification and alignment.

4. Ribosomal Database Project (RDP):

   • RDP (http://rdp.cme.msu.edu/) is a curated database that offers 16S rRNA sequences.
   • It provides tools for sequence analysis and classification.
   • You can download sequences and taxonomy information from their website.

5. QIIME (Quantitative Insights Into Microbial Ecology):

   • QIIME (https://qiime2.org/) is a widely used bioinformatics platform for microbiome analysis.
   • It provides tools for analyzing microbial communities, including processing 16S rRNA sequences.
   • QIIME often includes its own preprocessed 16S rRNA databases that can be used for analysis within the platform.

Before downloading any database, make sure to read the terms of use and citation requirements, as some databases may have specific usage policies. Additionally, consider the compatibility of the database with your analysis pipeline and software tools.

NCBI 16s RNA database location ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/blast/db/16SMicrobial.tar.gz

Updates to the Conserved Domain Database include:

• Position-specific score matrices (PSSMs) have been recomputed for many models in CDD, and frequency tables have been added to the PSSMs;

• The search databases distributed as part of this release can now be used with the more recent versions of RPS-BLAST (BLAST release 2.2.28 and up) using composition-based scoring. This abolishes the need to mask out compositionally biased regions in query sequences;

• Domain annotation displays in CD-Search, BATCH CD-Search, and other services now all use a uniform display style. A new display option in CD-Search and BATCH CD-Search provides “standard” results, in addition to “concise” and “full” results. “Standard” results will provide, for each region on the query sequence, the best0-scoring domain model (if any) from each of CDD’s database providers (Pfam, SMART, COG, TIGRFAMs, Protein Clusters, and the NCBI in-house curation project), but will suppress redundancy from within a single provider's results list.

You can access CDD at the Conserved Domains homepage and find updated content on the CDD FTP site.

Reference:

NCBI Website

More at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/HistoneDB2.0/index.fcgi/browse/

Address of the bookmark: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/HistoneDB2.0/index.fcgi/browse/

For example, you can run a search in Assembly and use check boxes (see left side of screenshot below) to refine the set of genome assemblies of interest. Then, just open the “Download assemblies” menu, choose the source database (GenBank or RefSeq), choose the file type, and start the download. An archive file will be saved to your computer that can be expanded into a folder containing your selected genome data files.

More at https://ncbiinsights.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2017/05/08/genome-data-download-made-easy/

NCBI Hackathon specifically looking for folks who have experience in computational virus hunting or adjacent fields to identify known, taxonomically-definable and novel viruses from a few hundred thousand metagenomic datasets that we’ll put on cloud infrastructure. This event is for researchers, including students and postdocs, who are already engaged in the use of bioinformatics data or in the development of pipelines for virological analyses from high-throughput experiments. If this describes you, please apply! The event is open to anyone selected for the hackathon and willing to travel to SDSU (see below).

https://ncbiinsights.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2018/11/09/ncbi-sdsu-virus-hunting-data-science-hackathon-january-2019/