Building Infrastructure for African Human Genomic Data Management

Human genomic data are large and complex, and require adequate infrastructure for secure storage and transfer. The NIH and The Wellcome Trust have funded multiple projects on genomic research, including the Human Heredity and Health in Africa (H3Africa) initiative, and data are required to be deposited into the public domain. The European Genome-phenome Archive (EGA) is a repository for sequence and genotype data where the data access is controlled by access committees. Access is determined by a formal application procedure for the purpose of secure storage and distribution, and must be in line with the informed consent of the study participants. H3Africa researchers based in Africa and generating their own data can benefit tremendously from the data sharing capabilities of the internet by using the appropriate technologies. The H3Africa Data Archive is an effort between the H3Africa data generating projects, H3ABioNet and the EGA to store and submit genomic data to public repositories. H3ABioNet maintains the security of the H3Africa Data Archive, ensures ethical security compliance, supports users with data submission and facilitates the data transfer. The goal is to ensure efficient data flow between researchers, the archive and the EGA or other public repositories. To comply with the H3Africa data sharing and release policy, nine months after the data is in secure storage, H3ABioNet converts the data into an XML format ready for submission to EGA. This article describes the infrastructure that has been developed for African human genomic data management

Assessing computational genomics skills: Our experience in the H3ABioNet African bioinformatics network

The H3ABioNet pan-African bioinformatics network, which is funded to support the Human Heredity and Health in Africa (H3Africa) program, has developed node-assessment exercises to gauge the ability of its participating research and service groups to analyze typical genome-wide datasets being generated by H3Africa research groups. We describe a framework for the assessment of computational genomics analysis skills, which includes standard operating procedures, training and test datasets, and a process for administering the exercise. We present the experiences of 3 research groups that have taken the exercise and the impact on their ability to manage complex projects. Finally, we discuss the reasons why many H3ABioNet nodes have declined so far to participate and potential strategies to encourage them to do so

Designing a course model for distance-based online bioinformatics training in Africa: the H3ABioNet experience

Africa is not unique in its need for basic bioinformatics training for individuals from a diverse range of academic backgrounds. However, particular logistical challenges in Africa, most notably access to bioinformatics expertise and internet stability, must be addressed in order to meet this need on the continent. H3ABioNet (www.h3abionet.org), the Pan African Bioinformatics Network for H3Africa, has therefore developed an innovative, free-of-charge "Introduction to Bioinformatics" course, taking these challenges into account as part of its educational efforts to provide on-site training and develop local expertise inside its network. A multiple-delivery±mode learning model was selected for this 3-month course in order to increase access to (mostly) African, expert bioinformatics trainers. The content of the course was developed to include a range of fundamental bioinformatics topics at the introductory level. For the first iteration of the course (2016), classrooms with a total of 364 enrolled participants were hosted at 20 institutions across 10 African countries. To ensure that classroom success did not depend on stable internet, trainers pre-recorded their lectures, and classrooms downloaded and watched these locally during biweekly contact sessions. The trainers were available via video conferencing to take questions during contact sessions, as well as via online "question and discussion" forums outside of contact session time. This learning model, developed for a resource-limited setting, could easily be adapted to other settings.IS

Designing a course model for distance-based online bioinformatics training in Africa: The H3ABioNet experience

Africa is not unique in its need for basic bioinformatics training for individuals from a diverse range of academic backgrounds. However, particular logistical challenges in Africa, most notably access to bioinformatics expertise and internet stability, must be addressed in order to meet this need on the continent. H3ABioNet (www.h3abionet.org), the Pan African Bioinformatics Network for H3Africa, has therefore developed an innovative, free-of-charge “Introduction to Bioinformatics” course, taking these challenges into account as part of its educational efforts to provide on-site training and develop local expertise inside its network. A multiple-delivery–mode learning model was selected for this 3-month course in order to increase access to (mostly) African, expert bioinformatics trainers. The content of the course was developed to include a range of fundamental bioinformatics topics at the introductory level. For the first iteration of the course (2016), classrooms with a total of 364 enrolled participants were hosted at 20 institutions across 10 African countries. To ensure that classroom success did not depend on stable internet, trainers pre-recorded their lectures, and classrooms downloaded and watched these locally during biweekly contact sessions. The trainers were available via video conferencing to take questions during contact sessions, as well as via online “question and discussion” forums outside of contact session time. This learning model, developed for a resource-limited setting, could easily be adapted to other settings

RDP5: a computer program for analyzing recombination in, and removing signals of recombination from, nucleotide sequence datasets

International audienceFor the past 20 years, the recombination detection program (RDP) project has focused on the development of a fast, flexible, and easy to use Windows-based recombination analysis tool. Whereas previous versions of this tool have relied on considerable user-mediated verification of detected recombination events, the latest iteration, RDP5, is automated enough that it can be integrated within analysis pipelines and run without any user input. The main innovation enabling this degree of automation is the implementation of statistical tests to identify recombination signals that could be attributable to evolutionary processes other than recombination. The additional analysis time required for these tests has been offset by algorithmic improvements throughout the program such that, relative to RDP4, RDP5 will still run up to five times faster and be capable of analyzing alignments containing twice as many sequences (up to 5000) that are five times longer (up to 50 million sites). For users wanting to remove signals of recombination from their datasets before using them for downstream phylogenetics-based molecular evolution analyses, RDP5 can disassemble detected recombinant sequences into their constituent parts and output a variety of different recombination-free datasets in an array of different alignment formats. For users that are interested in exploring the recombination history of their datasets, all the manual verification, data management and data visualization components of RDP5 have been extensively updated to minimize the amount of time needed by users to individually verify and refine the program's interpretation of each of the individual recombination events that it detects

Distance-based, online Bioinformatics training in Africa - the H3ABioNet experience

Presented  at the ECCB2016, den Haag, NL, Sept 2016<br><br>Africa is not unique in its need for basic bioinformatics training for individuals from a molecular biology background. However, unique logistical challenges in Africa, most notably access to bioinformatics expertise and internet stability, must be addressed in order to meet this need on the continent. H3ABioNet (<a href="http://www.h3abionet.org">www.h3abionet.org</a>), the Pan African Bioinformatics Network for H3Africa, has therefore developed an innovative, free Introduction to bioinformatics course taking these challenges into account. A distance-based learning model has been selected for this 3 month course (July-September 2016) to increase access to expert African and European Bioinformatics trainers covering several bioinformatics topics, including: databases and resources; genomics; Linux; sequence alignment; and phylogenetics. <br><br>Classrooms with a total of >350 participants are hosted at 20 institutions, across 11 African countries, in order to provide local administrative and academic support. Classroom selection was based on certain infrastructure criteria, including: computer resources; Internet access; and availability of local teaching assistants. Although lectures are delivered live to remote sites via an online platform, to ensure that classroom success does not rely on stable Internet, classrooms can watch pre-recorded and pre-downloaded lecture videos, as well as work through practical assignments on the lecture content, during biweekly contact sessions. Lecture recordings are available on the course website <a href="http://training.h3abionet.org/IBT_2016/">http://training.h3abionet.org/IBT_2016/</a>. While trainers are available via video conferencing to take questions during contact sessions, online ‘question and discussion’ forums, hosted on the course management platform, are also available. This distance based model, developed for a resource limited setting, could easily be adapted to other settings.<br><br

Africa: sequence 100,000 species to safeguard biodiversity

Build a major genomics resource on the continent to help breeders and conservationists

Pre-recorded lectures.

<p>Screenshot of a pre-recorded lecture with webcam activated. Note: Consent to publish this image was obtained from the individual in the figure.</p

Screenshots of Vula site for IBT_2016 course.

<p>(A) Landing page of course site showing all tools. (B) Forums tool specifically showing the number of people that read the response to a particular question. In this example, at the time that the screenshot was obtained, 14 people had read the question, and 12 people had read the answer. Please note: Consent to publish this screenshot was obtained from participants of the relevant discussion. Abbreviation: IBT, Introduction to Bioinformatics.</p

Virtual classroom using the Mconf web conferencing platform.

<p>Classrooms connected to the trainer and to other classrooms via the Mconf open-source web conferencing platform (<a href="http://mconf.org/" target="_blank">http://mconf.org</a>; in use here is the South African instance of Mconf <a href="https://mconf.sanren.ac.za/" target="_blank">https://mconf.sanren.ac.za/</a>, hosted by SANREN <a href="http://www.sanren.ac.za/south-african-nren/" target="_blank">http://www.sanren.ac.za/south-african-nren/</a>). Classrooms either activated their microphones or entered text into a chat box to ask questions to the trainer. Trainers activated their webcams while answering questions. Trainers were able to upload their session resources in the central panel of the Mconf interface should they have wanted to explain a concept on a particular lecture slide, for example. Note: Consent to publish this image was obtained from the trainer shown in the figure. Abbreviation: SANREN, South African National Research Network.</p