ANNOUNCING GIW/ISCB-ASIA 2014

By Paul Horton, Conference Co-chair

The International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB), the Japanese Society for Bioinformatics (JSBi) and the Association of Asian Societies for Bioinformatics (AASBi) are proud to announce GIW/ISCB-Asia 2014, the first joint conference between ISCB and GIW.

GIW has a strong history as a stage to communicate important scientific progress on computational biology in East Asia. As they say in that region, one look is worth more than a hundred reports. The photo below is from GIW 2013. Note the expression of astonishment on the faces of the 2014 conference co-chairs (Kiyoshi Asai and Paul Horton) as they intently focus on the lecture.

The positive influence of teaming up with ISCB-Asia for this year's GIW is evident in the exceptionally strong keynote speakers: Janet Kelso, Alfonso Valencia, Thomas Lengauer, Shinya Kuroda, Sang-Yup Lee and Masami Hirai, who will present the latest computational biology advances in areas ranging from archaic human genomes, cancer genomics, combination drug therapies, temporal coding of insulin action and metabolic engineering.

In addition to these exciting keynotes, the conference will continue the GIW tradition of a strong proceedings track, giving young researchers an opportunity to present "the devil in the details". Some selected presentations will subsequently be published in journals such as Bioinformatics,IEEE/ACM Transactions on Computational Biology, BMC Genomics, BMC Systems Biology, and Journal of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology.
GIW/ISCB-Asia 2014 will be held on December 15-17 in Tokyo, the city where GIW started 25 years ago.

Tokyo is a convenient, safe and modern city with a moderate climate and despite its status as the world's largest metropolitan area, enjoys good air quality. The conference venue is on the newly developed, highly popular and yet surprisingly spacious "Odaiba" waterfront area.

In addition to recreational opportunities, Odaiba is a research hub, home of the Computational Biology Research Center (AIST), and other national and municipal research facilities.

Tokyo (or Edo) also enjoys a rich history as the center of Japanese civilization for the last 400 years and offers numerous museums and tours for the curious.

December is a sunny month with average temperature of 9C and relatively long days (similar latitude to Malta). We are sure participants will greatly enjoy the conference, the venue, and the city as a whole.

Potential sponsors or exhibiters are encouraged to contact Stacy Slagor, Director of Corporate Relations and Development, ISCB at stacy.slagor@iscb.org or the local administrator, Hiroko Sakai, at sakai-hiroko@aist.go.jp.

Important dates:

• August 11 - Highlights Track Submission Closes

• August 24 - Poster Submission Closes

• Octobor 6 - Last Poster Submission Closes

• November 10 - Early Bird Registration Closes

For more information please see the official website at www.jsbi.org/giw2014/