The GIGA V conference (http://www.gigacos.org/index.php/meetings/giga_v/) was held at the scenic oceanside Intercontinental Hotel along with an optional dive excursion to the nearby Rosario Islands, possessing extensive coral reefs. GIGA is grateful for sponsorships from various quarters such as the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the American Genetics Association, the United Kingdom’s Sanger Institute, GigaScience Journal, and anonymous donor, and Pacific Biological Life Sciences (PacBio) Inc. With help, GIGA was able provide travel sponsorships to at least a dozen Global South students from Colombia, Brazil, Chile and Peru. After starting the conference with a costumed Halloween icebreaker, students and early career researchers had several opportunities to present their ongoing research through lightning talks and a poster session during the meeting. For example, NSU Department of Biological Sciences MS student Rachel Bacaner working in Dr. Lopez’s laboratory presented a poster on Caribbean octocoral Antillogorgia americana cell cultures.
Major themes of the sessions included marine symbiosis (coral and algae) and characterizing biodiversity at the molecular level and professional development. Over 65 students, faculty and researchers composed the GIGA V attendees representing eight different countries. Three speakers were invited for keynote lectures, given by Dr. Sarah Lemer (Univ of Guam), Dr. Jingchun Li (University of Colorado), and Dr. Vanessa Yepes (Instituto de Investigaciones Marinas y Costeras) (INVEMAR). The list of stimulating talks spanned detailed descriptions of individual species genomes from giant clams to golden mussels, technical talks on how to best analyze volumes of Big Sequence Data and the effects of climate change. Attendees also heard unique talks describing JEDI (Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion) within the genomics sciences by Sadye Paez (Rockefeller University) and , and the future of scientific publishing in the era of open access and artificial intelligence by Laurie Goodman (Giga Science). Abstracts of all talks can be downloaded here .
Lopez Lab @ NSU 