Our member, Irena Spasic, lead a team of staff from Computer Science, MIB and MCISB (Irena Spasic, Farzaneh Sarafraz, John A. Keane and Goran Nenadic) that took part in an international text mining challenge in the clinical/health-care domain, whose aim was the extraction of medication-related information from narrative patient records. We are pleased to announce that our team repeated the last year's success and was among the top ranked teams for the second year running. Overall, they were ranked third out of 19 teams taking part, with the same significance level as the second ranked team.

This one day event is designed to catalyse the development of partnerships between our academic community and industry that will lead to new lines of innovative research and technology. The day will consist of talks by representatives from industry and MIB academics on their "Perspectives of systems and synthetic biology", together with information from funding bodies and a poster session highlighting current research in this field in Manchester. Further information

The Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation (iSEI), the Centre for Social Ethics and Policy (CSEP), & the Manchester Centre for Integrative Systems Biology (MCISB) are delighted to announce the following public lecture by Professor Denis Noble, focusing on the philosophical aspects of his research:

On The Music of Life: A new paradigm for biology

The lecture is planned for the 25th of November, at 16:00, in the Lecture Theatre of the Manchester Interdisciplinary Biocentre (MIB - North Campus). All are welcome.

Denis Noble is Professor Emeritus and co-Director of Computational Physiology at Oxford University. He is one of the pioneers of Systems Biology and developed the first viable mathematical model of the working heart in 1960. His research focuses on using computer models of biological organs and organ systems to interpret function from the molecular level to the whole organism. Together with international collaborators, his team has used supercomputers to create the first virtual organ: the virtual heart. Noble is also a leading philosopher of biology, and his internationally acclaimed book The Music of Life: Biology beyond genes challenges the foundations of current biological sciences, questions the central dogma, its unidirectional view of information flow, and its imposition of a bottom-up methodology for research in the Life Sciences.

Two of our members (Vangelis Simeonidis and Natalie Stanford) are presenting their work on Systems Biology during the MIB internal conference.

(Ir)reversible decisions in dynamic cell biology and how they work.

Seminar at 1pm Wednesday 28th October 2009, MIB Lecture Theatre

From 2D Bioinformatics to 4D Systems Biology.

Seminar at 1pm Wednesday 15th July 2009, MIB Lecture Theatre

Manchester Centre for Integrative Systems Biology, 28-30 July 2009

A hands-on workshop designed to teach modelling and simulation of biochemical networks using the software COPASI and the SBML language. The Workshop is directed both at beginners as well as advanced users and there will be sessions directed at each of these groups. The workshop will also be an important means for the COPASI development team to collect feedback from users to improve the software. [read more]

A new paper describing an integrative approach, combining public data and software resources for the rapid development of large-scale text mining tools targeting complex biological information has been published in Bioinformatics.

Irena Spasić, Evangelos Simeonidis, Hanan L Messiha, Norman W Paton and Douglas B Kell (2009) KiPar, a tool for systematic information retrieval regarding parameters for kinetic modelling of yeast metabolic pathways. Bioinformatics, in press [DOI: 10.1093/bioinformatics/btp175]

Some of our members are taking part in the Great Manchester Run.

To support our fundraising effort, please visit our team page and sponsor us.

Time: 10.00, Sunday May 17 2009

Place: Manchester city centre

Spatial and temporal information coding by the NF-kappaB system.

Seminar at 1pm Tuesday 17th March 2009, MIB Lecture Theatre

The 3rd FEBS Advanced Lecture Course on Systems Biology: From Molecular Biology to Biological Function.

Tom Bellamy, of the Babraham Institute is presenting his work on "Neuron to astrocyte signalling in the cerebellum" in room 2.048 of the MIB, on Thursday the 29th of January, at 10am.

The Centre for Plant Integrative Biology, at the University of Nottingham, hosts the 2008 BBSRC Systems Biology Grantholder Workshop from 15-17 December 2008. This workshop brings together the six Centres for Integrative Systems Biology, and also involves grantholders from related BBSRC-funded initiatives. [read more]

Our member was in the winning TEAM in one of the two tasks in the Second shared challenge in Natural Language Processing for Clinical Data: Obesity Challenge: Who's obese and what co-morbidities do they (definitely/likely) have? The challenge was organised by Informatics for Integrating Biology and the Bedside, i2b2. [read more]

A new paper demonstrating a consensus yeast metabolic network reconstruction obtained from a community approach to systems biology has been published in Nature Biotechnology.

Markus J. Herrgård, Neil Swainston, Paul Dobson, Warwick B. Dunn, K. Yalçin Arga, Mikko Arvas, Nils Blüthgen, Simon Borger, Roeland Costenoble, Matthias Heinemann, Michael Hucka, Peter Li, Wolfram Liebermeister, Monica L. Mo, Ana Paula Oliveira, Dina Petranovic, Stephen Pettifer, Evangelos Simeonidis, Kieran Smallbone, Irena Spasi?, Dieter Weichart, Roger Brent, David S. Broomhead, Hans V. Westerhoff, Betül Kirdar, Merja Penttilä, Edda Klipp, Bernhard Ø. Palsson, Uwe Sauer, Stephen G. Oliver, Pedro Mendes, Jens Nielsen and Douglas B. Kell (2008) A consensus yeast metabolic network reconstruction obtained from a community approach to systems biology. Nature Biotechnology, Vol. 26, No. 10, pp. 1155-1160

Following the appointment of Professor Douglas Kell as the next Chief Executive of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), Professor Hans Westerhoff has taken up the role of the new director of the MCISB. Professor Pedro Mendes is now acting as the deputy director of the Centre.

Pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline and The University of Manchester have agreed a new research alliance that will help meet the challenge of accelerating translational research efforts within each organisation. [read more]

The Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills has today announced the appointment of Professor Douglas Kell as the next Chief Executive of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). [read more]

Two Systems Biology related FEBS courses are being organised over the 2008 summer period:

New Developments in Quantitative Molecular Bioscience, Island of Spetses, Greece, 10-17 September 2008.

The 3rd International Course in Yeast Systems Biology, Lundberg Laboratory, University of Gothenburg and Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, 2-19 June 2008.

Anyone interested can apply online using the above links.

The MCISB is organising a seminar by Dr Markus Kollmann from Humboldt University, Berlin.

The title of the lecture is: "Perfect Robustness against Non-Genetic Variations in Bacterial Signaling".

Time: 13.00

Place: Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre, Lecture Theatre (building 16 on the map).

The BioModelling Network is organising a meeting for researchers who are working on or are interested in modelling yeast gene expression and its regulation.

Time: 9.00

Place: Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre, Room G.010 (building 16 on the map).

CHEMICAL MARKUP, INFORMATICS AND DATA-DRIVEN SCIENCE

MCISB/NaCTeM Workshop

Programme (with speakers' notes)

Time: 10.30 - 17.00, Tuesday March 4th, 2008

Place: Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre, Room G.010 (building 16 on the map).

Some of our members are taking part in the Sport Relief Challenge.

To support our fundraising effort, please visit our team page.

Time: 9.00 - 17.00, Sunday March 16

Place: Albert Square, Manchester

The MCISB is organising a workshop entitled "Systems biology is a joined-up world". The workshop will cover several issues and viewpoints of Systems Biology, especially with regard to the perspectives for future research and funding opportunities.

For further information, please contact Dieter Weichart.

Time: 10.30 - 17.00, Monday January 21

Place: Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

The MCISB, the DTC and the BioModelling Network are jointly organising a meeting for researchers based in MIB who are working on or are interested in biological modelling. All are welcome.

Time: 14.00 - 16.00, Friday January 11

Place: LG.010, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

The MCISB is organising a workshop on Parameter Estimation and its application in Systems Biology.

If you plan to attend, or for further information, please contact Vangelis Simeonidis.

Time: 13.00 - 17.00, Wednesday November 7

Place: Lecture Theatre, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

The BioModelling Network is organising a tutorial on COPASI and its use. Our speaker will be Prof Pedro Mendes, Chair in Computational Systems Biology.

The title of the lecture is: "COPASI Tutorial".

If you plan to attend, or for further information, please contact Vangelis Simeonidis.

Time: 10.00pm - 12.00pm, Wednesday September 12

Place: Room LG.010, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

The BioModelling Network is organising a lecture by Clive Bowman, Chief Statistician at GlaxoSmithKline .

The title of the lecture is: "Statistical Bioinformatics: On using the correlations of divergences ".

Everyone is welcome to attend.

Time: 15.00pm - 16.00pm, Wednesday September 12

Place: Room LG.010, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

For further information, please contact Vangelis Simeonidis.

The BioModelling Network is organising a lecture on network dynamics by Ralf Steuer from Humboldt University, Berlin.

The title of the lecture is: "From Topology to Dynamics of Metabolic Networks".

Everyone is welcome to attend.

Time: 12.00pm - 13.00pm, Wednesday August 29

Place: Lecture Theatre, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

For further information, please contact Nils Bluthgen.

The MCISB is organising a workshop on Taverna and its use in a research environment.

Dates: Friday July 27 and Monday July 30

Place: Room LG.010, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

For further information, please contact Katya Tarasova.

The BioModelling Network is organising a Lecture on System Identification and Experimental Design by Dr Martin Brown.

The title of the lecture is: "System Identification and Experimental Design - How to best use your data".

Everyone is welcome to attend, and feel free to invite whomever else might have an interest in the topic.

Time: 14.00pm - 16.00pm, Tuesday March 13

Place: Lecture Theatre, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map).

For further information, please contact Vangelis Simeonidis.

The BioModelling Network is organising its second course on Enzyme Kinetics, which will be presented by Dr Jacky Snoep and will focus on Kinetic Modelling.

The title of the course is: "Construction and analysis of kinetic models of Saccharomyces cerevisiae: Applications to glycolysis, cell cycle and mixed population studies".

Everyone is welcome to attend, and feel free to invite whomever else might have an interest in the topic.

Time: 10.00am - 12.00pm, Friday June 30

Place: Room LG010, Manchester Interdisicplinary Biocentre (building 16 on the map and the main entrance is opposite the Geo Begg building, or accessible via the stairs from Princess / Upper Brook Street)

For further information, please contact Vangelis Simeonidis.

On October 25th of this year begins a two day event to mark the official opening of the MIB. Over the two days a number of guest speakers along with key MIB researchers will deliver talks in the following subject areas:

Today the MIB building hosted an unofficial opening by the president of the University of Manchester Professor Alan Gilbert. The process of moving staff and equipment into the building will now begin in earnest.

The Times Higher Education Supplement, published 13th May 2005 [view article]

Scientists at the MIB have secured £6.3m of research council funding to create the Manchester Centre of Integrative Systems Biology as part of a larger initiative by the BBSRC/EPSRC.

The new centre will help to revolutionise the way that bioscientists think and work, by enabling multidisciplinary research combining theory, computer modelling and experiments in a systems approach across the life sciences and industry.

The majority of the funding has been provided by the BBSRC but in recognition of the importance of multidisciplinary research approaches the EPSRC will be providing £1M for the centre specifically to facilitate the integration of engineering, physical sciences and mathematics.

The Centre will be based in the MIB and will integrate cutting-edge bioscience research with theoretical modelling and mathematics.

This initiative has been led by Professor Douglas Kell. For further information please contact dbk [at] manchester.ac.uk.

Manchester Press (14 March, 2005) [view article]

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology, vol 5, November 2004 [view article]

The ultimate goal for biology is to become a science that formulates out understanding of subcellular, cellular and multicellular systems in terms of quantitative, holistic models that are underpinned by the rigorous principles of physical science and mathematics. This can only be achieved through interdisciplinary research that draws heavily on the expertise and technologies of the physical sciences, engineering, computation and mathematics. Here, Professor John McCarthy discusses the benefits and challenges (both intellectual and practical) of interdisciplinary bioscience.

Education Guardian, 22nd October 2004 [goto website]

World-class academics and cutting-edge facilities sugest exciting times ahead for researchers in the north-west. Bioscience, cell research, tissue engineering...

Nature, vol 427, 5th February 2004 [view article]

The Manchester Interdisciplinary Biocentre is scheduled to open in 2005. The Institute will be the first large-scale centre of its kind in the country. More than 500 staff, including up to 85 investigators, will pool their talents to study systems biology from the nano to the macro scales.

Nature, vol 425, 25th September 2003 [view article]

The merger of VUM and UMIST is creating a chance to break out of Universities that are solely organised around traditional disciplines. Perhaps the most tangible example of such thinking is one of the University's most ambitious building projects, the Manchester Interdisciplinary Biocentre (MIB).