NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Genome Canada and the Canadian Institute of Health Research will award C$6.3 million (US$6.1 million) to research projects under its 2012 Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Competition to develop new tools to deal with the large volumes of data being generated from genomics research, Genome Canada said on Thursday.
Under the new grants competition, Genome Canada will provide C$5 million and CIHR will provide C$1.3 million. Around C$4 million of the total funds will support large-scale projects by multi-disciplinary teams to develop user-friendly tools for use in genomics research, and C$2.3 million will support small-scale projects by individuals or groups working on innovative projects that could have a significant impact.
"Through this investment, we are supporting the development of new tools and methods necessary to keep Canada at the leading edge of this fast-growing field," Minister of State for Science and Technology Gary Goodyear said in a statement.
"The genomics research community has an urgent need for efficient computational tools to collect and analyze data. Genome Canada has made it a priority to invest in this area so that key economic sectors from forestry to fisheries, agriculture to environment, energy to mining and human health have the ability to reap the full value of genomics research," Genome Canada President and CEO Pierre Meulien said.
"The more effectively we can analyze and interpret genomic data, the greater our understanding of life at its most fundamental level," added CIHR President Alain Beaudet.
Genome Canada said that the large-scale research projects, which will be conducted in collaboration with Canada's six regional Genome Centres, are expected to secure an extra C$4 million in co-funding.