Biodiversity Cell Atlas Meeting

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About

Cells are the fundamental units of life – underlying cooperative functions in multicellular organisms and complex temporal life cycles in microbial eukaryotes. In recent years, the rapid advance in single-cell genomics technologies, combined with the growing availability of whole-genome sequences, opened up the opportunity to systematically map cell types in diverse organisms.

The goal of the Biodiversity Cell Atlas is to articulate a community effort to build whole-organism cell atlases across the diversity of life, working in a phylogenetically informed way, supported by high-quality genomes, and using shared standards that make comparisons across diversity possible. This coordinated effort should boost our understanding the evolution and diversity of life at cellular resolution: from gene regulatory programs, through cell type molecular profiles, to biological interactions between species.

To make this possible, this first meeting will bring together leading experts in biodiversity genomics, in model organism cell atlas initiatives, and in comparative single-cell genomics. We will discuss the opportunities and challenges ahead for reconstructing the cell type tree of life.

Organizers

Arnau Sebé-Pedrós (Centre for Genomic Regulation)
Roderic Guigó (Centre for Genomic Regulation)
Mara Lawniczak (Wellcome Sanger Institute)
Detlev Arendt (European Molecular Biology Laboratory)
Amos Tanay (Weizmann Institute of Science)
Irene Papatheodorou (EMBL's European Bioinformatics Institute)

Supported by

Program

May 15th, 2023

09h00 Welcome & Organizers Introduction to the Biodiversity Cell Atlas initiative

Session 1: Considerations towards a BCA from the perspective of large-scale cell atlasing projects

Chair: Amos Tanay

09h30 Aviv Regev (Broad Institute) - TBD
09h45 Sarah Teichmann (Wellcome Sanger Institute) - Cell atlasing ecology and biology
09h55 Stein Aerts (VIB Leuven) - The Fly Cell Atlas
10h05 Seung Yon Rhee (Carnegie Institution) - The Plant Cell Atlas
10h15 Discussion and questions

10h30 Coffee break

Session 2: Considerations towards a BCA from the perspective of biodiversity genomics projects

Chair: Irene Papatheodorou

11h00 Harris Lewin (UC Davis) - The Earth Biogenome Project
11h15 Mark Blaxter (Wellcome Sanger Institute) - Single-cell sequence locally, think globally
11h25 Sadye Paez (Rockefeller University) - Ethical and equitable considerations for the Biodiversity Cell Atlas
11h35 Mara Lawniczak (Wellcome Sanger Institute) - TBD
11h45 Discussion and questions

Session 3: Comparative study of cell type diversity and evolution

Chair: Arnau Sebe-Pedros

12h00 Detlev Arendt (EMBL) - Animal diversity and cell type evolution
12h15 Tom Richards (Oxford University) - TBD
12h30 Ulrich Technau (Vienna University) - Cnidarian developmental cell atlases
12h38 Ina Arnone (Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn) - Sea urching developmental single-cell atlas
12h46 Heather Marlow (Chicago University) - Comparative Analysis of Cell Identity Networks
12h54 Jake Musser (Yale University) - Profiling cellular diversity in sponges informs animal cell type and nervous system evolution
13h02 Discussion and questions

Sponsor talks

13h15 Resolve Bio
13h25 10x genomics

13h35 Lunch

Session 4: Experimental challenges of the BCA

Chair: Mara Lawniczak

15h00 Allon Klein (Harvard University) - Single-cell transcriptomics: general considerations for the Biodiversity Cell Atlas
15h10 Nikolaus Rajewsky (MDC) - TBD
15h20 Holger Heyn (CNAG-CRG) - scRNA-seq method benchmarking
15h30 Jordi Solana (Oxford Brookes University) - Cell fixation strategies for non-model organism scRNA-seq profiling
15h38 Hanh Vu (EMBL) - TBD
15h46 Susana Coelho (MPI Tübingen) - Brown algae cell atlas - Challenges of single-cell genomics with cell walls
15h54 Arnau Sebe-Pedros (CRG) - Single-cell genomics sampling from the wild with minimal infrastructure
16h02 Discussion and questions

16h20 Coffee break

Session 5: Data analysis and integration for the BCA

Chair: Detlev Arendt

16h50 Amos Tanay (Weizmann Institute of Science) - Comparative single-cell data analysis: integrating and standardizing the Biodiversity Cell Atlas
17h05 Irene Papatheodorou (EBI) - Databasing for the Biodiversity Cell Atlas
17h20 Jaime Huertas-Cepas (CBGP) - Large-scale comparative genomics for the Biodiversity Cell Atlas
17h30 Roderic Guigó (CRG) - The impact of partial genome annotations for comparative single-cell analyses
17h40 Discussion and questions

Session 6: Peripheral vision - applications of the BCA

Chair: Roderic Guigo

18h00 Mafalda Dias/Jonathan Frazer (CRG) - Leveraging genetic variation across evolutionary timescales
18h10 Manuel Irimia (CRG) - Comparative analysis of gene expession
18h20 Casey Dunn (Yale University) - The unification of phylogenetics, population biology, and developmental cell lineages: same tree, different scales

Registration

Registration free-of-charge HERE

Application deadlines
On-site attendance: 30th April, 2023
On-line attendance: 14th May, 2023

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Contact and Venue

Contact

Anna Borrell
Communications & PR Department
CRG - Centre for Genomic Regulation

Venue

PRBB Auditorium
CRG - Centre for Genomic Regulation
Dr. Aiguader, 88
08003 Barcelona, Spain
www.crg.eu

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Biodiversity Cell Atlas Meeting